


Nothin' About Redemption

by futureboy



Category: Saturday Night Live, Weekend Update (SNL)
Genre: 2010-2013, Alcohol, Canon Compliant, Clubbing, Coming Out, Domestic Fluff, Friends to Lovers, Friendship, Holidays, I've also embedded the videos from canon so I'm sorry for any of Stefon's content there, Jewish Stefon Zolesky, M/M, No Smut, Recreational Drug Use, Sexuality Crisis, Slow Burn, Strangers to Lovers, This is rated for weed and club drugs tbh, snl references
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-19
Updated: 2020-01-31
Packaged: 2021-02-27 07:35:35
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 50,433
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22323430
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/futureboy/pseuds/futureboy
Summary: Seth first got word of Stefon actually existing at some point in 2008.[Seth Meyers and Stefon Zolesky’s friendship,et cetera,from behind the Weekend Update desk and outside of it. Content warnings are tagged. Now complete!]
Relationships: Seth Meyers/Stefon, Seth Meyers/Stefon Zolesky
Comments: 179
Kudos: 242





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> _This is a fair use, non-commercial fanwork. I have nothing to do with SNL. Stefon’s character belongs to John Mulaney, his face to Bill Hader, and his fictional hand in marriage to Seth Meyers - who, in this fanwork, is the persona represented in Weekend Update, and not the actual Seth Meyers. No-one in this fic represents their real-life counterpart._  
>  Read: ohmygod, don’t take me to court please.
> 
> What’s good NBC?? Please don’t sue me. I just think your characterisation is interesting, and to be honest, writing this has been my only distraction from my shitshow of a country. Leaving me here with the inappropriate party rat and the long-suffering news anchor would be smashing. Cheers.
> 
> Title from ‘Thrash Unreal’ by Against Me!.

_They don’t know nothin’ about redemption_ _  
__They don’t know nothin’ about recovery_ _  
__Some people just aren’t the type for marriage and family_

**April 2010**

Seth first got word of Stefon _actually existing_ at some point in 2008. Something about David Zolesky’s estranged possibly-only-half-brother… A man who pitched a Disney sequel so raunchy and raucous that bringing Walt himself out of cryo-sleep, if only to witness him losing his shit at the person responsible, was seriously considered.

So when the schedule lists **S. ZOLESKY - CITY CORRESPONDENT** as _‘confirmed!’_ , he’s more than a little suspicious.

“You’re _sure_ that he’ll have real, concrete information?” he asks, tugging at Alex’s sleeve as they head to rehearsal. “And that he’s gonna be _normal?_ You keep giving me the strangest people to interview, and to be honest, some of them make me--”

“--feel impressed?”

Alex looks _way_ too pleased with himself. 

_“_ No… _Uncomfortable,”_ Seth corrects him. God, it’s too early for this. He throws his arms out, almost knocking down a runner with unfortunate timing: “I know you think they’re funny, but sometimes _I_ like to laugh, too. You sent me that Canadian singer who showed the pictures of the sick dogs. Then there was Barbie’s 50th, with the ‘Tickle Time’... A couple of the junior writers are actually starting to tally my on-air harassment count. A-and remember when Zaccone and Dinato got busy in my dressing room?”

“Oh, the gay couple from New Jersey?” Alex asks. “I heard they had quite the _spread_ waiting for you.”

Seth doesn’t wanna talk about it. “Look, you’ve got most writing authority on my segment. Can you promise me that this is gonna be a breather for me?” he begs. _“Please?_ Hell, bring back The Devil! I had a great time interviewing him!”

“I’ll see what I can do,” Alex promises, and strides determinedly off-set.

“Wait-- Alex? You didn’t actually-- Okay,” sighs Seth, and wonders what kind of dynamic is about to get wedged behind his desk this time.

Stefon is not normal. Stefon is Not A Breather.

He’s shaky, and so cautious it almost manifests as suspicion, like he’s a spooked, feral cat. Right off the bat he opens his mouth, and a whole _world_ of acceptable slurs, headlining minority groups, and niche cultural references comes tumbling out, in a way that Seth can only sum up with: “I’m s-sorry… I’m sorry, _what?”_

And right after that, he seems to relax a little more. Like he’s learning. Which is part of his whole schtick, of course - that he can walk into a place, catalogue its inner machinations, and deem it Hot or Not. Stefon seems to know when to leave a space for an urgent question, and for that matter, is oddly hyper-aware of the ‘gaps’ in Seth’s knowledge of the underground club scene. Some of the features are self-explanatory. A couple of them require… elaboration. (Some of them Seth doesn’t wanna know about at all.)

But above all, he’s got an open mystery about him. Like if Seth knew the right questions to ask, then Stefon would happily tell him _everything,_ except there’s no concrete place to even begin with. He’s just a guy with a bold fringe, sliding past his early thirties on a sheen of lip gloss, in a body that appears to be a size up from what he expected: slightly too tall, slightly too broad, and moving with a degree of calculation that balances it all out.

Against everything… Seth invites him back.

He _did_ genuinely have a good time talking with him. And it’s a little bit so he can mess with him, too, because Seth’s kind of an asshole. He wants to figure out why he’s so jittery and nervous. Why he’s wearing an Ed Hardy shirt in a women’s cut. Why he’s letting New York City chew him up and spit him out.

They shake hands in the loosest sense of the term; Stefon doesn’t seem to know how to do it, and cradles Seth’s knuckles in his palm while he maintains eye contact. It contradicts all of his earlier nervousness in five startling seconds, and it shocks a laugh out of Seth’s throat before he can stop himself. There’s only one reaction left in him at this point, and it’s ‘blind acceptance’.

Mostly, though, Seth invites him back for one simple reason: Stefon didn’t assault him.

  
  


**May 2010**

Alex is totally fucking with him now. But then, this _is_ the writer who sent him Sir Charles Barkley to report on ‘60 Years of Communist China’, so what is he fucking expecting at this point?

Stefon’s more put together in terms of his presentation - he’s wearing eyeliner and he’s done his eyebrows, but he’s still shaking like a shitting dog and it’s absolutely fucking _bizarre_. Plus, now that his hair is sitting perfectly and his lips are suitably _un_ -chapped, he’s got nothing to do with his hands, except press them against his face in increasingly frantic positions.

This time, he seems to let his actual personality out around the point Seth asks, “...what is a Human Bath Mat?”

It sounds illegal. Not to mention morally wrong. But then Stefon does this giggly tongue thing against his teeth, where it _kinda_ looks like he’s messing with Seth? And though Seth was certain that Stefon was weird and neo-fetishistic before, now he’s not sure if some of those things he lists are downright _lies_.

(Human Bath Mats… God help him.)

It’s nice, though, that Stefon doesn’t seem as afraid as he did the first time they met. When Seth comes to offering his customary handshake once again, Stefon repeats his odd little finger-shake. But this time, when Seth chuckles and accepts it, Stefon seems to want to try it again to correct himself - except Seth’s already drawn back, leaving Stefon pawing at the air. The man’s hand sweeps alarmingly close to his knee under the desk.

“Stop it,” Seth says, cracking up, and follows it up with an “ _al_ \--alright,” when he allows Stefon to poke at his face teasingly.

Compared to some of the other shit he’s been through (Snooki’s a great girl but his optometrist is starting to hike up consultancy rates), Stefon’s almost _gentle_ with his overt flirting. Plus, he doesn’t leave any unidentifiable residue on Seth’s suit when he touches him, which is always a bonus.

It almost puts him on edge, like there’s gonna be some huge fallout that’s in the process of building up.

But it’s the season finale, and his girlfriend finds it funny when he flirts with guests on-air. 

He’s lucky to be dating someone who’s so cool about it, and he appreciates that - which means that over the summer, Seth briefly forgets about the whole affair.

  
  


**October 2010**

He’s sat backstage watching the opening monologue, when there’s a crinkly nudge at his elbow, and a disembodied voice states, “pastries.”

“Huh?”

“Pastries,” John repeats, whapping him with the bag again. “I asked you at rehearsal yesterday if you wanted anything for tonight? And you said, _‘oh, God Almighty, anything with enough butter and sugar in to prove my point about the diabetes story!’_ , so I stopped by the bakery on my way over.”

Seth lunges for the sack of starch on offer. “Oh my God, this is the best day of my life. How many did you _get?”_

John blinks. “Well, I wasn’t sure if your premenstrual-esque hunger for baked and fried dough had settled on a _theme_ just yet… So, uh… Y’know. All of them.”

For a grand total of two seconds, Seth’s really very touched by this - he’s had a remarkably stressful October, what with his girlfriend being stuck on a high-profile investigative case that she can’t realistically abandon for a weekend together. Not to mention the crazy-intense candidates that are breezing through his segments for the election period.

Then he opens the bag.

“…John?”

“Yes?” says John, as though nothing is amiss.

Seth takes a measured breath. “Why does every single baked good in this bag have a single bite taken out of it?”

“Oh,” John says brightly, “I thought you wouldn’t mind sharing.”

“Sharing,” says Seth.

“Yes. You see, if I were to take just one,” John explains, “then Sod’s Law would dictate-- I take it you’re familiar with Sod’s Law?”

“I am.”

“Right. Then Sod’s Law would dictate that out of the twenty-three pastries I recovered, I would end up eating the _exact_ variety that would bring you the most enjoyment. And I didn’t wanna deprive you of it.”

Seth’s too tired for this.

“Well, you know what?” he says, feeling ‘blind acceptance’ prematurely overwhelm him. He claps a hand on John’s shoulder: “thanks, man. I appreciate it. You’re welcome to share a whole one if you want, though, seriously.”

John wiggles his fingers gleefully and picks out a cinnamon roll; Seth, on the other hand, crams as much sugar into his face as he can before Weekend Update gets called to mic up.

It’s a weird one, that evening. John’s _I Love It!_ piece is relaxing, but the guy from The Rent Is Too Damn High Party is really full-on, and his handshake nearly leaves Seth’s pinky finger with a crush injury. It’s a shame John had already dipped into his stash of ‘blind acceptance’ energy, too, because _then_ there’s Stefon. Highly strung and locking his ankles together under the desk, while Seth tries not to vibrate from the sugar rush that just barreled into him.

“Relax, buddy, you’re gonna do great,” he grins, unable to look away from the camera out of sheer terror that he’ll end up asking Stefon questions about his life, deviating from the whole segment, and getting the two of them into some kind of formal network trouble.

Stefon’s rings are on different fingers, he notices.

He’s not entirely sure why he _does_ notice. They clink together when Stefon demonstrates a particularly animated password, and he’s apparently begun to bait Seth with club portmanteaus. Furkels, huh? Every day’s a school day.

And he _still_ invites him back. Like… _publically_ , on-air. And this is despite the fact that he had to hastily write an honest-to-god _letter_ on a blank sheet of printer paper last Wednesday, because Stefon’s unexpectedly dropped off the grid, and shows _no_ signs of hooking himself back up to it anytime soon.

As he closes Weekend Update this time, he opts for a high ten instead of a handshake. Stefon, of course, lands somewhere in between the two of those actions, and shimmies their joined hands in the air for a few delighted seconds. It’s not as dainty as he expected. There’s a moment where Seth imagines Stefon leading him off the set, still holding on, but it doesn’t happen. (He dismisses the whole idea and mentally files it away under the category _‘Fantasies, Weird & Unexpected’_.)

He and John aren’t going to the customary afterparty - John’s not really a fan - so the two of them are gonna head back to _el apartamento Meyers_ to share a smoke or two and shoot the shit. (Well, Seth is going to _smoke_. John will maybe smoke a cigarette, and still end up as lazy as Seth'll be.)

Oh god, the pastries. In less than an hour, Seth isn’t going to give one single, solitary turd about whether or not they have bites out of them.

He’s almost finished wishing everyone a good night, pastry bag tucked safely under his arm, when he spots a duo conversing in the wings. For the first time, he realizes that he’s never _actually_ spoken to Stefon after the show’s wrapped, and he’s finally at the point where Stefon might not pass out from speaking to him away from the desk. So he decides to approach him.

“You’ve certainly got _my_ vote,” Stefon’s saying airily, “and the vote of _everyone_ at **Club Jaillise** , because I know for a _fact_ they all agree with you.”

“About the rent?” says Jimmy McMillan.

“Of course! That place has everything. Squatters… Vagabonds who like to read… The Hunts Point Salsa Group…”

“Hey, Stefon!” Seth interrupts, tapping him lightly on the shoulder, “and hey there, candidate McMillan, how’re you doing?”

“Just fine,” he grizzles, “but I really must be off, I have a last-minute meeting to be getting to. Thank you for your vote, Stefon, it’s good of you...”

They watch him amble down the corridor, seemingly led away by his own beard.

“Byeeeee,” murmurs Stefon.

Seth glances at his little cupped wave. “So, Stefon… You did great tonight,” he starts, “you really don’t have to be so nervous. I’m pretty sure our conflicting target demographics are exactly the kind of war crime that Alex had in mind for me, so you can relax. The audience love you!”

Stefon’s eyebrows shoot up so high that one of them is completely obscured by his fringe. “Really?” he says breathlessly. “I thought maybe you were getting disappointed with me.”

“Nahhhh,” Seth draws out. “You should see the travel lady, for a start. I’m not kidding… And neither is she. Croissant?”

He offers out the paper sack, and Stefon angles his nose over the opening. “Thank you, Seth Meyers,” he breathes, and accepts a macaroon that is noticeably crescent-shaped.

Seth cringes. “Sorry they’ve all got bites out of them,” he says sheepishly. “There’s a story. Kind of like your ‘all of it’ answer... It doesn’t matter.”

But Stefon shakes his head: “oh, no,” he says, holding the macaroon aloft between thumb and forefinger - it’s orange, like some kind of Halloween lunar event - “that’s fine, second dibs is pretty standard where I’m from.”

“Right,” Seth says. He’s not entirely sure what that means. “Of course. Is that in your forecast for tonight, then? Any second dibs-ing happening?”

“Oh, no,” says Stefon again, and picks at the edging, until there are enough crumbs dusting his fingertip to suck into his mouth. “I’m at a new place called **Mmm- _Hmm_**... There’s gonna be the usual Cookie Crisp, and that one room where you have to sew your pockets shut before you can enter, but tonight they have a special feature. My style instructor Melvin is there, and he’s teaching the Freemasons how to do a first dance in heels.”

“That sounds nice,” Seth strains. “Is there much difference to a normal dance in heels?”

“Oh, honey, there’s a _whole_ lot less dress-hiking,” he says, and breaks out into a shy smile. “How about you? Going to the crew’s afterparty?”

Seth shrugs. John’s probably in the lobby, pacing the soles of his shoes down right now, but he can fucking wait. “No, no… No clubs, no afterparty,” he says casually, “I’m just hanging out with John tonight. Relaxing, catching up, y’know? We haven’t for a while, so...”

“Ah,” Stefon says, with an unsettling twinkle in his eye, as though he knows exactly what Seth's going to get up to. “I saw him. The Freckle Salesman. Have fun, Seth Meyers.”

He takes a bite out of the macaroon. Now it’s shark tooth-shaped.

“You too,” says Seth, and takes a few steps backwards before he commits to leaving. “Have a nice night, Stefon.”

John complains for a solid quarter-hour after he emerges from the elevator. It continues all the way down through their subway stops, and only peters out three blocks from the apartment. Seth can’t bring himself to care.


	2. Chapter 2

**December 2010**

He’s starting to really look forward to Stefon’s appearances.

They bounce off each other in the best way - even his girlfriend agrees, on the rare occasion when she manages to filter Weekend Update through her DVR. The two of them just seem to be linear, despite the subject matter:

 _-Stefon, how have you been?_ _  
__-The same._ _  
__-Okay._

It’s easy and maddening and so outlandish that it makes Seth’s head spin sometimes.

 _‘The same’_... Jesus Christ. He should have expected that kind of response, to be honest. But then… Stefon’s breathless, yeah, except it’s less of an affectation and in more of a ‘hyperventilating’ way? Which is extremely worrying and sets off _so_ many of Seth’s internal alarms.

As a result, he tries to be gentle with his interrogation. He doesn’t want Stefon to pass out on stage, so he sits through the man not being able to count on his fingers properly, and noticing that his rings have changed positions again (only on one hand, though), and then the most _disturbingly_ accurate Miss Piggy impression that Seth’s ever heard in his life.

He doesn’t know it yet, but it’s his first indication of Stefon containing an array of noises that don’t seem to belong to his body. Even _Stefon_ seems surprised that the _HIII-YAH!_ came out of him.

And despite the fact he spends most of the segment hiding his mouth behind his wobbly, clenched fists, it’s kinda the first time that he seems to be… Well, _enjoying_ himself. The nervousness is still present, but his hesitancy has completely evaporated, like a trust in Seth’s ability to help him continue finally got established somewhere down the line.

He even busts out a _‘lay it on me, my man, what’s your question?’_ , giggling the whole way through, and Seth really wishes he’s better at suppressing a smile.

Then comes the kicker.

 _No-one ever invites Stefon to_ _normal_ _Christmas._

God. It’s clearly bait.

 _So_ clearly.

But Seth invites him to Normal Christmas anyway. Because that’s what they’re doing with each other, apparently: swapping ins, and never _ever_ giving each other outs.

Well, it's _mostly_ because of that, and slightly because of his girlfriend’s comments about how she’d _love_ to meet their City Correspondent. Stefon delights her; weirdly enough, she’s not too keen on meeting Snooki, though.

(That’s her loss. Snooki’s great. She's, like.... Seth's second-best Weekend Update guest.)

It’s their last show before Winter Break when it all turns a little upside-down. Like, Seth _really did_ invite Stefon to Christmas in New Hampshire! And then, on the eighteenth, he gets a call two hours before the show that gives everything that extra degree of difficulty. He’s still reorganising his holiday period ten minutes before Weekend Update rolls, texting furiously in the wings and mentally striking through ideas on his calendar.

Luckily, the show before break is never high-stakes. Everyone’s starting to wind down, preparing for a few weeks of well-deserved rest, and Update goes off without a hitch. There's an actual, real-life baby on Brad Pitt’s weather report, and he's not even stressed out about it. It's all cool. (Though admittedly that could have _very_ rapidly gone south.)

He introduces the part where Governor Paterson, Stefon, and Snooki are supposed to sing them out, and makes himself scarce so that he’s not a distraction.

Because _Christ_. Whose idea was _this?_

It’s weird, seeing part of Weekend Update happen without actually being on set - from in the wings, with the lights down low, Seth gets to observe it all for once. The spotlights. The snow. Governor Paterson sings like a grandfather at Midnight Mass; Snooki’s just happy to be there.

And Stefon wriggles uncomfortably between them like an agitated rectangle, pulling at his sleeves and only sort-of mumbling the lyrics.

The apprehension has made a re-emergence. Maybe it’s because Seth isn’t there to bounce club suggestions off, but Seth dismisses that idea near-instantly. It can’t just be _him_. If he says it out loud, it’ll probably come off egotistical as hell, so he watches the trio interact with the falling snow and waits for his cue.

“Are we gonna smoosh?” Snooki asks Stefon.

Seth watches with rapt horror as Stefon says, “I have a girrrlfriend, sorry,” and then _immediately_ looks shifty.

Very interesting indeed. 

Then at last the song comes to a conclusion… Ish. Seth launches himself back onto the set, skidding on fake snow, and yells the outro into the crowd - there’s a part of him that wants to let Stefon know that he’s close by, and won’t let anything (or any _one_ ) happen to him. He starts with an arm around his shoulder, but rapidly progresses to the other clapping him jovially on the front.

And Stefon _tackles_ him. Like a kid brother would.

Seth’s still cackling to himself and chanting a mantra of _‘oh no! oh no!’_ when they’ve long tripped out of the shot. “Oh my god, _stop_ ,” he wheezes, as Stefon backs him into the wings, “I can’t breathe, man, uncle! _Uncle!”_

“Well, _someone_ has older cousins,” Stefon giggles, reluctantly allowing Seth to untangle himself from their confused limbs. “I’d say you were in a frat, but most frat boys don’t let someone else assert dominance over them so easily.”

Seth brushes down his suit jacket and motions for Stefon to follow him to the dressing rooms. “Wow, we got a social psychologist on our hands here, ladies and gentlemen!” he says. “I didn’t know you were the Sherlock Holmes of masculine submission.”

“You didn’t know, but you _should_ have suspected,” Stefon smiles. He’s got fake snow resting in his hair; Seth doesn’t dare brush it away.

“You’re right. I should have. One second, I’ll be quick--”

He barges the dressing room door open with his shoulder.

“We got a change of plans on our hands here, and I’m _really_ sorry about it,” he rambles, lunging for his possessions. Stefon edges his way into the room as though the doorway isn’t wide enough for him. “I hope you don’t mind, but we’re, uh, we’re not going to New Hampshire after all--”

“Oh?”

He loosens his tie and doesn’t miss the way Stefon’s eyes follow the knot. “Yeah, my girlfriend’s tied up with a seasonal report - you know I said she works in Nevada?”

“Dedicated…”

“So she can’t come up for Christmas.”

“Oh _noooo_.”

“Which means my family said, _hey, let’s all go to Seth’s for New Year’s instead!_ So they’re coming down later, and I’m staying here.”

“And it’s just Stefon and Seth Meyers in the Big Apple for Christmas,” Stefon nods.

“Yeah. I understand if you’ve got other plans,” says Seth, shrugging his way out of one jacket and into another. “I bet you’ve got clubs left, right, and center to review, my terrible cooking can’t even begin to compete with that--”

Stefon looks scandalized. “And leave you all alone?!” he squawks. “On _Christmas?!_ Stefon hasn’t even been _near_ your cooking yet!”

“Right,” Seth laughs, and buttons up his coat at the same time as he strides towards the door again. “That’s the thing, I can pick it all up tomorrow if you still wanted to come over, but you’d have to help out. If that’s okay. My plan was to eat at two and then get wasted with a kid’s movie on in the background.”

Someone calls Seth’s name as they dart into the corridor, and he throws a hand up in farewell. Time to get outta here. 

They luck out with a half-empty elevator - he exchanges a brief greeting with the lady who operates Camera 3 - and Seth lets Stefon prod at all the buttons until theirs is appropriately lit.

“Is that usual?” Stefon asks.

“Uh… Kids’ movies? Doubt it. ‘Usual’ is _It’s a Wonderful Life_ , I guess,” Seth admits. “My dad loves that flick, but I always thought it was kind of… depressing. And my mom still won’t let us watch _How the Grinch Stole Christmas!_ because the animation gave me nightmares.”

“Childhood trauma,” Stefon nods. “I had that with _Return to Oz_.”

Seth cringes. “Hm, _no_ … I was, uh, twenty-three.”

The camerawoman snorts.

“It doesn’t even matter, shuddup!” he says sharply, “Chuck Jones is _scary_. I don’t know a _single_ person who likes those Tom and Jerry cartoons, you can ask anyone!”

The elevator doors ding. “He can’t hurt you now,” Stefon says, guiding Seth into the lobby by his elbow, “they’re just squiggles, honey, _no_ dog is that dynamic. All that trit-trotting is a lie.”

Seth huffs out a laugh. “Do you promise?”

“I promise,” Stefon says, as gravely as he can manage, and lets go of Seth’s arm to crowd his face with his hands. (Seth’s started to think of it as Stefon’s _Home Alone_ tic.)

They emerge onto Rockefeller Plaza; the cold clings, and it’s biting, and Stefon isn’t wearing a jacket. He’s pulling his sleeves down again.

“It’s like, thirty degrees,” Seth says.

“I run hot.”

It’s apparently the end of the topic.

Seth tries again.

“You okay?”

“Checking for Snooki,” Stefon shivers, glancing over his shoulder, “I _don’t_ want to get got by the Clementine Menace on my own turf, _thank_ you…”

“Right, that whole thing,” he grins, because he can’t help it, and tightens his scarf. “I thought that might have something to do with tonight. And even if it didn’t… You seemed a little on edge again there, buddy.” 

For a second, Stefon busies himself with his gloves - adjusting the way that they stretch out and web, where tall fingers meet palm.

Seth’s about to interject - it’s starting to get awkwardly quiet - when eventually, Stefon smiles.

“Sometimes things can be scary, Seth Meyers,” he says, slowly, like he’s wary of screwing it up. “But it doesn’t mean you won’t have _fun_ with them. Sometimes you can love scary things… Sometimes, you can be changed forever, in a beautiful way.” 

And Seth’s whole _brain_ takes a second to buffer.

Wow.

He glances up, hastily side-stepping a lamppost. Stefon’s not doing the tongue thing, or pointing his hands away from his chest, so Seth’s fairly certain he’s not being fucked with. As a matter of fact, he’s wearing an oddly open expression, edging on ‘sweet’, with his eyelashes low.

“Y’know?”

Seth tries to remember to focus on where he’s walking, and not to stare. “That was really philosophical of you, Stefon,” he says, “I’m impressed.” 

“Thanks,” Stefon beams.

“No problem--”

“I was thinking about that time I tried Human Fondue.” 

Aaaand there it was. There’s a huff of stifled laughter from beside him, as Seth feels his awe slide from his face to make room for a _complete_ lack of surprise. He should've known. Stefon’s fixing him with concentrated anticipation, in exactly the same way he does when he leaves a ‘question pause’ in his pacing on Weekend Update.

“Ah, here we go,” Seth mutters, and he takes a deep breath, before resigning himself to losing more of his innocence.

* * *

On Christmas Day, Stefon turns up at his door at exactly thirty-two minutes past nine in the morning. Seth had been told to expect this; when he’d pointed out that Stefon could just turn up at the time he wanted to in the morning, he’d been subjected to a sharp lecture on ‘the science of being fashionably late’, and then been pressured into inviting over for nine AM anyway.

“I brought music,” he says, breezing into the apartment with a satchel banging against the backs of his knees. He starts counting it off on his fingers: “Seventies bedroom pop, carolling dubstep, industrial Hanukkah…”

“That’s a new one,” says Seth, and shuts the door. “You look-- different. Like, _nice_ different. I mean-- Sorry, that came out wrong.”

Stefon spins on his bedazzled heel. He’s switched his usual shirt out for a short-sleeved Ed Hardy piece instead. A koi swims through the light green, and he’s paired it with a burgundy long sleeved undershirt.

Stefon in a new outfit feels a little like getting used to using the New York City subway. The first couple of glances are jarring, and the whole world rattles over the clash of colors and motifs. Then after a while, the apprehension isn’t worth it. Weirder shit is gonna happen at some point - no point wasting your caution on something that’s morbidly interesting at worst.

“I’ll accept,” Stefon breathes. “I don’t know _what_ my friends at **The Backroom** would say if they knew I was accepting fashion compliments from a man who dresses like Donald Trump, but they’re not part of your primetime audience, so I should be safe.”

There’s a _lot_ of information there to digest.

He fumbles at the obvious one: “The Backroom?”

“Yeah,” Stefon smiles, and gets a _little_ too close, to trail the back of his hand down Seth’s sweater. “Entrance at the rear.”

Seth mutters an _oh no_ to himself that makes Stefon wheeze. “Come help me peel potatoes,” he says, and makes for the kitchen, “I just set the timer for the ham, so that should be good to go in a while. We’ll have to put work in for the rest, but I think I’ve salvaged some kind of bachelors’ Christmas meal for us.”

Stefon raises an eyebrow as he follows him through his home.

“Not-- Not ‘bachelor’ like that,” Seth corrects. “Yeesh, you pick up on _everything_. A conversation with you has to be the most airtight thing ever.”

“Are you faulting me for being an optimist?”

He rummages through his kitchen drawers: “ _yes_ ,” Seth grins, and slides a potato peeler across the counter. “I’m looking to date one person, and one person _only_. Buddy, I am _way_ too lazy for cheating.”

“Who said anything about cheating? Stefon’s not a homewrecker,” he says proudly. “Stefon is a _renovator_. It’s like, that thing where strangers move your furniture into annoying places and paint your walls puke colors.”

“I need you to understand that that’s actually a thing. But, uh, _no…_ I’m not breaking up with my girlfriend for you. Not sorry.”

Stefon aims a put out expression at a potato, which he’s currently holding like he’s performing that scene from _Hamlet_. “You know fries are better with the skins _on_ , right?”

“You think a Normal Christmas plate has a spot for _fries_?!” Seth splutters.

“What else would you have?”

“Mashed potatoes!” he says, “like at Thanksgiving! Stefon--”

But Stefon, still flirting, jabs him gently in the ribs with the peeler point. “Look me in the eye, Seth Meyers,” he retorts, “and tell me that you don’t want Christmas fries.”

Seth looks him in the eye.

Fuck.

“Put this on and get scrubbing, Zolesky,” Seth grouches. Stefon gets an apron to the face for his trouble. “Damnit, of _course_ I want Christmas fries, that’s like, the best idea ever.”

Well, so much for Normal Christmas. Stefon’s already tying his apron strings into some kind of elaborate Scout’s knot, smug as anything, and Seth just _knows_ that as far as Normal Christmas and Stefon Christmas went, this one was going to turn out as an off-brand hybrid of the two.

“Can I tell you a secret?”

“Of course.”

Stefon bites his lip. “I like Normal Christmas.”

“This is quiet, as far as Normal Christmases go. But yeah, me too,” Seth says. “Were you expecting to?”

“I knew I would,” he says, sounding affronted. But then he adds, in a smaller voice: “...I like quiet Christmas, too.”

Dinner is an easier affair than Seth thought it would be. Though he insists on sitting to eat at the dinner table, Stefon eventually persuades him to pick at leftovers in the kitchen while cleaning up (and starting on the booze), with seventies bedroom pop soundtracking the afternoon. It’s a very enjoyable genre. Suited to the pie-preparation, too.

“What are you decorating there?” Seth asks suspiciously. He squints at Stefon’s pastry art - there’s some kind of bird ruffling its feathers on top of the filling.

“It’s a robin,” Stefon says, sticking his tongue out in concentration. “Like the British put on all their stupid Christmas letters or whatever. It’s got red boobs, so I thought it’d fit.”

Seth dusts flour from his elbows. “You know, I have to respect that,” he says, “you actually sound like you thought it through specifically for _this_ pie. That’s logical, man.”

“I’ll admit, when you asked me ‘apple’ or ‘cherry’, I thought you were talking about lube,” Stefon pouts, and _there_ it is, _that’s_ the breaking point which every compliment seems to reach.

“You spoiled it. Yup, it’s gone.”

“Noooooooo,” he whines, sprinkling sugar on his creation, in a way that reminds Seth of how childless women pick up kindergarteners’ used tissues.

They end up sprawled over Seth’s couch, various drinks in - this includes a half-assed pot of spiced mulled wine that Seth threw a few oranges into and left to simmer, which he probably should have done long before the whiskey came into play. But they’ve got liquid coal running through them, and there’s a snowy-looking animated movie murmuring across the room. So it’s not a complete disaster.

Better than slumming it alone in New York, he figures.

Stefon raises his glass to his lips. He’s got his legs slung over one side of the armchair and his elbows bracketed on the other, wedging himself in sideways, and the stem swings elegantly from between his fingers.

“So… this is Normal Christmas?”

“Yeah,” Seth says measuredly. He picks an orange seed out of his glass; there’s a sloth onscreen playing dead, which doesn’t come across as very festive, but hey, he isn’t in charge of scheduling this shit. “Your Twelve Days themed party was about thirteen items too long. Christmas is supposed to be slow. It’s kicking back for the cold days. And stuff like, I don’t know, doing traditional routine things, just ‘cos rituals bring people together. Spending time with the people you love.”

“Oh, Seth _Mey_ ers!” Stefon bursts, “was that a _confession_?”

“No,” he says hurriedly, waving the idea away as fast as he can, “no no _no_ , that was not a confession--”

“It’ll be a spring wedding,” Stefon gushes. “Late February.”

Seth sits up. His glass is in danger. “There’s _no wedding_. No confession. I don’t even believe in February. It’s not _happening._ ”

“Not even with Lady Nevada?”

“That’s not even _close_ to her name. It’s Nicole,” Seth says automatically. Then, thinking about the question, he adds: “what do you mean?”

“Y’know…” Stefon drawls. “Marriage. Rugrats. A four-bedroom house that she won’t let _you_ decorate. Are they in the cards?”

Seth remembers being pretty good at magic tricks during high school. And he was even _better_ at gambling during college. (A few nude forfeits aside.)

The point is, he knows his cards very well, and marriage? Kiddos? A colonial repro where he’s not gonna be allowed to pick the paint swatches? It’s not even in the damn _deck_.

Not right now, anyway.

Stefon doesn’t take well to his silence, and takes it upon himself to fill the gaps in the conversation.

“What’s she like?”

“Don’t copy her,” Seth warns.

“I _won’t_ , I just like to know my competition.”

There’s a slightly tense moment, in which Stefon pushes his lips out in a mock-kiss, and Seth sets his wine glass precariously on his knee to wipe his sweaty hands. “Well,” he starts, “she’s got black hair, she’s Jewish, she’s the most practical person I know… She’s an investigative journalist. Out in the field a lot, y’know? Right now she’s looking into illegal electrical hookups by squatters and the homeless as part of a housing report, some of that engineering is crazy.”

Stefon waggles his eyebrows. “Sounds dangerous,” he says, with too much relish.

“Yeah, well, she’s been taking these self-defense classes. Hands-on _and_ the hard stuff like mace. I bet she could even kick _your_ ass.”

“And what’s that meant to mean?”

“That you’re too tall for your own good,” Seth snorts. He gets a chunk of orange rind to the face when he adds: “how’s the weather up there, champ?”

“It’s hailing, bitch!” says Stefon, and pings another piece across the length of the couch.

“Good!” Seth shouts, swatting it away, “she _loves_ that kinda weather! Loves _all_ shitty cold weather, that’s why she likes coming up to the family home-- You think _Nevada_ can get twenty-seven inches of snow at a time? Hell no!”

“Why go all the way up _there_ ,” Stefon retorts, “when you could have the off-yellow New York slush that NatGraph described as ‘the meteorological lovechild of IBS and brain matter’?”

With an unrestrained snort - the inside of his glass misted over for a split second - Seth gives up the battle. He’s gone wine-dizzy.

“Don’t you mean Nat _Geo_? Short for National Geographic?”

“No,” say Stefon, tilting his chin up in defiance, “I mean Nat _Graph_ , short for Natalia Graphik. She’s the leading ‘street chic’ expert on New York City’s greatest trash piles. You should have seen her exposé last year, she mapped liquid graffiti artists by tracking their territorial back-alley pissing.”

“That’s disgusting.”

“She was also the first person to launch her own line of Human Garbage Disposals,” he adds, in a disconcertingly proud tone.

The couch is suddenly polygonal under his ass, his cushion digging corners in at every opportunity, so Seth shuffles himself around and internally prepares for a bad mental image.

“Stefon… What are Human Garbage Disposals?”

He winces against a gulp of red before answering. “It’s that thing, where a teenager under four foot lives in the space under your sink? And his little mouth is open, and he eats your leftovers… You can even get the kind that chew through bones--”

“Oh, god, stop,” Seth says. “I’m imagining the sound. It’s _not_ good.”

“Let me tell you, it’s better than Snooki’s singing voice,” Stefon giggles - his head tips back as he laughs, and his lips are stained around the little winter-chapped lines of his Cupid’s bow, and it’s really the first indication Seth’s had of him surpassing ‘tipsy’ and careening towards ‘smashed’. He watches as Stefon pulls his sleeves down over his wrists, an identical shade to the contents of his glass: “She _really_ tried it with me. I think she might be the only overly-friendly hot dog I ever backed off from.”

Seth laughs into his bottom lip, digging his teeth in. After a second, he asks the million-dollar question:

“...Do you really have a girlfriend?”

Ankles cross from where they’re suspended over the arm of the chair, distracting Seth’s eyeline, and Stefon smirks. “Oh, I used to, but then she entrickeneured me,” he says, and uncharacteristically, he doesn’t wait for Seth to interrogate him. “It’s that thing when your significant other says they need to borrow a twenty so the pot dealer doesn’t have to count quarters, but what _actually_ happens is they steal your cards to open a officewear flip-flop business and ruin your credit line.”

Red wine always leaves an outline when it gets splashed, Seth finds. Like a dark red pencil sketched out a crime scene for grapes. He scratches at one of the circles on his glass with his fingernail, vacant and awkward.

“Stefon… That’s _terrible_.”

“It’s okay, she’s really successful now so I don’t have to talk to her,” he rambles, and then his face falls near-imperceptibly: “because she doesn’t want to bother with _Stefon_.”

Seth’s about to tack something on, like maybe his sympathies.

Then Stefon smirks, and says, “also her roommate nailed me, so that maaaay have been a contributing factor in our relationship breakdown.”

No trace of a blush surfaces. Not even a _smidge_ of shame. Every time Stefon provides him with a sentence, he’s always gifted with a generous amount of information to process; he blinks away his surprise, because he’s _not_ surprised by that turn of events, not really.

“Was that _before_ or _after_ she committed fraud against you?”

Stefon drains his glass. “After.”

“Oh, that’s fine then,” Seth grins, “I think you were perfectly entitled to boink her roommate. Was she hot?”

“ _Very_ ,” agrees Stefon, “but only on weekends. During the week they were just a regular-looking gender-non-conforming businessperson.”

It takes a second for him to wrap his drunken brain around that one. Woman on the weekend. Got it. “You know… In places,” Seth says, recalling a selection of the phrases Stefon slings around his newsdesk, “you’re _very_ forward-thinking, Stefon.”

“Why, _thank_ you, Seth Meyers! What can I say, a suit and tie does it for me,” Stefon grins shamelessly. Seth throws him a faux-flustered _oh, stop it!_ motion, and gets to his feet to head to the kitchen, fully intending to ladle more alcohol into his glass. Stefon follows with what is only a fraction less than his usual grace. So maybe the guy doesn’t blush, but he can definitely _stumble_. “I have to say,” he continues, as they navigate the crap they couldn’t be bothered to cram in the dishwasher, “you’re _very_ unpredictable in places yourself. Being okay with technical-cheating if she wronged me? Now _that’s_ not very New Hampshire of you.”

“Eye for an eye,” Seth shrugs. He’s considering getting shitfaced.

“Makes the whole world blind?”

“Well, no,” he explains, taking Stefon’s glass from him to refill it, “just means that she wouldn’t be able to see you copping a feel on her roommate.”

Stefon clambers onto the counter and giggles into his fresh drink. “Or read my credit card,” he beams.

Nice. Seth apparently handled that topic with more finesse than he usually would. Thank _you_ , Christmas booze. He leans back on his elbows, avoiding the wet patch around the sink, and _tings_ their glasses together: “so there’s really no-one else in Stefon Zolesky’s life right now?”

“No. My last boyfriend thought I was too weird,” Stefon says. He’s swinging his feet from his perch - even his socks have sequins on, what on fuckin’ _earth_ \- and with a hooked pinky finger, he excavates a heap of cherry pie filling for himself.

“Well, you don’t wanna be with someone who can’t handle the puppet karate room, right? That would be _suuuuper_ lame,” Seth grins.

The diffusion attempt succeeds again; Stefon smiles around his finger, blood red and ruby mingling on his bottom lip.

Seth’s so frickin’ pleased and smug with his social aptitude, goddamnit, that he doesn’t even protest too much when his mouth is dabbed at with pastry, as Stefon insists on ‘feeding him dessert like in the movies’.

(But then again, it may have been down to the alcohol. His defenses are low. What can he say?)


	3. Chapter 3

**February 2011**

Seth squints at the board. Huh.

“Yeah, we’re bringing in the club kid again,” Alex says, materialising from nowhere, and eliciting a shriek of _Jesus Christ!_ from Seth’s now-soulless body. “Hope you don’t mind.”

“I _do_ like to be told about these things, y’know,” Seth grouches, but there’s not much he can do about it now. He hopes his displeasure comes off more as annoyance that Stefon’s gonna be useless, rather than annoyance that he could have been hyped for this particular guest slot all week - he’s got a sneaking suspicion that Alex might stop inviting Stefon onto the segment, if he knew Seth liked hanging out with him.

Stefon is business as usual.

It’s endearing as hell. When Seth brings up the crazy temperature variation they’ve been having, he agrees with the wrong thing, muttering that _everywhere I go it’s like, a hundred degrees_ … And Seth vaguely recalls him saying once that he ‘ran hot’. It’s probably nothing to be concerned about.

Funnily enough, there’s little to suggest Stefon’s feeling more romantic than usual. His cultural references are all swirling into one lump, sure, but they curdle together in the same way most of his club summaries do. So Seth decides that he can take the segment in a different direction, this time around - they’ve been through a lot together, right? He feels like he can add a personal touch to it now, and the rejection of **Booooooooof** is his way of distancing objectivity.

He hasn’t critiqued from his own perspective before. First time for everything. It definitely riles up Stefon, in all the best and most satisfying ways.

“Take me, for example...”

“Gladly,” Stefon smirks.

He knows it’s time for another jab when he feels Stefon’s gaze on him, raking roughly down his Weekend Update suit. “I’m trying to find a place to take my _serious_ girlfriend,” he says, carefully masking his face, “we’ve been dating for a couple years...”

And he keeps on delivering context, even though it’s not news to his guest, while Stefon plays up his reaction for their audience. It feels natural.

Stefon suggests **Hooyagoosyoughoooou!** as a date location for him. Built on a dare… Fuji Howser, MD… It’s the standard.

(At first, Seth reacts with genuine disappointment to the lineup.)

But then, as Stefon elaborates, he has to fake his exasperation. In an oddly touching turn of events, Seth realizes that in club terms, this would be a _perfect_ best-case-scenario for his partner. ‘Mole people’ aligns with the report which held her up in Nevada. Stun guns, because Seth said she was taking self defence classes. She loves cold weather, and Stefon’s found her a night to remember with ‘freezing cold air’ - not to mention the Jewish freakin’ Cupids.

All stuff Seth told him at Normal Christmas.

Clearly he needs a well-thought out retaliation for this out-of-the-blue stab of friendship, so Seth does the unimaginable:

“--I don’t think my girlfriend would like that.”

It's the ultimate personal blow (which he’s not going to say out loud, thank _you_ ). So it has to work, except it doesn’t, because Stefon’s flirting gets a thousand times more overt, and Seth's forced to ramp up his horror. He is, in fact, so _very_ gleefully outraged.

He also gets to be more scandalized in response to suggested gift ideas such as ‘Human Suitcases’... Now that he knows that Stefon has actually participated in those ideas, and that they’re actually Real, it’s easier to cringe at them. All he has to do is imagine a sink-person chewing on bone like it’s nothing.

If Stefon hadn’t been so weirdly considerate with his recommendations - Seth’s beginning to think that he _is_ good at his job, and might just be being asked the wrong questions - then maybe the whole _Stefon’s single, he doesn’t haaaave a Vaaalentiiine_ spiel wouldn’t have ended up the way it did.

But because Seth’s a kinda-sentimental asshole, he says he got ‘struck by Jewpid’s Arrow’. It’s close enough to what he means. It’s not that Stefon is someone nice to settle down with, because chances are he _isn’t_ , and also because the two of them are both workaholic jerks. But the general message is there.

Plus, it’s like… February twelfth. His girlfriend isn’t gonna get mad. Nicole doesn’t fly into New York until tomorrow at noon, and anyway, she’s too appalled with Lil Wayne and Eminem’s Valentine’s Day song to notice Seth hanging out with a buddy after work. Chances are that she’s already asleep.

Just to make sure he wins their impromptu battle, Seth throws in one extra douchebag wrench - when Stefon extends a palm, finally on board with the whole ‘handshake’ business, he ignores it in favor of a hug.

A _hug_. A loose one, with a lot of back patting on Stefon’s part, but a hug nonetheless.

“That was _great_ ,” Alex tells him, as soon as they creep into the wings, “that was really something, man, you’ve got it down. It’s generating interest like _crazy_ , people wanna know what you’re mad about--”

“Mad?” Seth blinks.

“Yeah! You get worked up about all this dumb club stuff and the viewers relate to it,” Alex grins, “it’s totally working. All those useless answers… You’re, like, the People’s Reaction.”

Maybe he’s missing something here.

“It’s not dumb,” he starts, but then Sound begin to unclip his mic, and he doesn’t get to elaborate on how it’s _not dumb, just unseen, it’s_ _different_ _and it’s for him and it’s not for people like_ _us_ _._

He grabs Stefon’s sleeve as he slinks by. Stefon’s confusion is childlike; Seth knows better.

“Wait, you’re not leaving, right?” he asks. “I thought we had a date?”

“Oh, you meant it!” says Stefon, looking pleased.

Seth is affronted more than he thought he’d be. He pulls back. It’s actually a little offending that he wasn’t taken at face value. “What?! Of _course_ I did,” he says, “wait for me outside the dressing room, yeah?”

“Am I not even gonna get invited inside?” Stefon flirts, hooded eyes chasing the mic lead that trails into Seth’s suit.

But he follows the instruction to the letter, for once, and within ten minutes, Seth’s breezing through his dressing room door with a bad idea and a promise to keep.

“Put this on,” he tells him, throwing his scarf in the general direction of Stefon’s head. “Hundred degrees my _ass_ …”

Stefon doesn’t respond with _oh yes, it certainly is_ , but the way he leers at Seth’s legs for a few hot seconds sure says that he’s _thinking_ it.

“Where are we going?”

“Up,” says Seth simply.

He lets him press the button. The elevator trip is quiet; Stefon side-eyes him with puzzled amusement. They’re the only ones in the building who aren’t scrambling for the lobby, it seems, but Seth’s got a few tricks up his sleeve to get them _exactly_ where the two of them need to be.

It’s mostly his ID card. Plus some bright smiles at the security guards up top. No bribes needed - don’t fix what ain’t broke, he thinks, if your face alone can get you past the velvet ropes.

The last guard, patrolling the upper floor, eyes them suspiciously. “Hey, Mister Meyers,” she says, in a thick Brooklyn drawl, “you don’t usually come up here so late. Sightseeing with your pal here?”

“He’s my Valentine,” Seth explains cheerfully.

The guard raises her eyebrows, and digs out her keys to unlock the staff door.

“Thanks, Carla.”

“No problem,” she says, waving them through, “you know where to go. If you’re not back in twenny minutes, I’m coming in to toss you on your ass, m’kay?”

Now Stefon’s even more confused. The lights in the upper lobby spring to life as they move onwards, floating through the curved corridors, and Stefon makes grabby hands at Seth’s coat sleeve.

Seth lets him. “You really don’t know what’s up here, do you?”

“I’m hoping it’s a California King,” Stefon snarks right back, “penthouse with a view, chilled champagne, unlimited room service...”

“Just for twenty minutes? Not quite,” Seth says, and pushes open the door to the main event.

Stefon peers out into the night, and positively _gapes_.

“You’re not scared of heights, right? I probably should have asked that before we got here,” says Seth, wandering out onto the deck. The only lights on are gentle torchlights, in faint yellows and toasted reds, and they spot him warmly against the February bite. “This place closes at midnight, so we’re the only ones hanging out. Luckily the alarms don’t go on until two… Sometimes the broadcasters like to bring people up here. Business stuff. Y’know?”

He looks over his shoulder, only to see that Stefon’s still curled behind the door in the darkness.

“You coming?”

“I love heights,” Stefon breathes, and steps gingerly out onto the brickwork like a deer on ice.

Top of the Rock is always a winner. It’s impressive, plainly and simply - even from the deck they’re on, the lower one with the glass viewing sheets, there’s nothing tacky about it. Every light in Manhattan is laid out for them like a blanket of LEDs, a circuit board in the inner machinations of New York City, and the sheer depth is the kind of perspective that can dizzy even the most seasoned mountaineers.

Seth loves this city. But that’s why he figured Stefon might like this kinda thing - he loves New York just as much as him, if not more.

He rests his hand at Stefon’s elbow and guides him forwards.

“We’re south-facing,” he says, pointing at one of the compasses decorating the floor, “see? This is the Empire State side. It’s right over there. You can see straight down Fifth Avenue.”

They reach the glass. There’s city glitter sparkling in Stefon’s eyes. “Have I died?” he asks faintly.

“What? No, you haven’t died,” laughs Seth, “I promise, look, that’s the New York Times Building. And there’s the Bank of America Tower… the Chrysler Building… the one with the crown-looking stuff on top, that’s 383 Madison. And-- oh, _wait_ , don’t look over there, sorry. That’s Trump Tower.”

Stefon presses his palm against the glass and stares.

He’s silent. Stunned. Seth lets him enjoy it. He’s got the added bonus of having been here before, so he can afford the luxury of closing his eyes - the only thing going through his head right now is New York. The cold kills that specific city smell, way up here on the sixty-ninth floor, so he takes a deep breath.

No cast. No crew. No Weekend Update. Just lights and life from afar. Sirens, which would usually be piercingly blaring from ground level, are oddly peaceful up here; they warble skywards, rising and falling and airy and haunting, in a droning, judicial lament.

He opens his eyes.

The horizon is blinding, and Stefon’s still staring.

“I can’t believe you’ve never been up here before.”

“Mainstream is too much for Stefon,” he breathes. His eyes don’t leave the Empire State Building for a second. “And mainstream is _expensive_.”

“Yeah, but stuff’s mainstream on purpose,” Seth points out, “things are popular for a reason, right?”

“I guess.”

He squints. “Wait,” he says, realizing abruptly what this might mean. “Do you mean that there’s other tourist-y crap you’ve never done?”

“You know I’m a club scene kind of girl, Seth Meyers--”

“The Met,” he says. Oh _noooo_. “The Guggenheim… Never?”

Stefon glances at him for the first time. “No,” he confirms. “Not really my scene.”

“No wonder you didn’t have any suggestions for Normal Christmas! Wait, wait a sec-- I’m guessing you’ve not been up the Empire State Building, you’re still gawping at it. What about--” he pauses to prematurely grimace, “--what about the Statue of Liberty? You live in New York City, Stefon, _tell_ me you’ve been.”

Stefon grins awkwardly and shrugs like, _ey, whatcha gonna do_. “I’ve never even been on a _ferry_ ,” he confesses, and holy shit, Seth wants to repeatedly bang his own face against the viewing panels.

“I’ll take you,” Seth promises. It’s not kind; it almost edges on 'spiteful'. “That’s ridiculous. You’re ridiculous, Stefon, that’s _insane_ , it’s a cultural jewel in the crown of our country and you live here and you haven’t fuckin’ _been_. How old are you? Thirty-three?”

“Not _yet._ I'm--”

“Fine, thirty- _two_ years old and not even _another human being_ has thought to take you to the Goddamn Statue of Motherfucking Liberty. What a tragedy,” he finishes, shaking his head, “what a _travesty_. We can fix this.”

“Okay,” says Stefon, who sounds like he’d only been half-listening to the outburst.

He takes Seth by the hand, and looks back out onto the city.

Seth’s passion evaporates like gasoline.

The metal of Stefon’s rings burns cold against his skin. No entangled fingers - just clasped palms. It’s not an _unpleasant_ turn of events, but like with most of Stefon’s actions, it’s surprising and somewhat inappropriate.

“What’re you doing?” Seth mumbles.

Stefon doesn’t move. Their hold remains firm and frigid. His eyes flicker over the point on the Chrysler Building again, before turning back on Seth; there’s nothing fun in his expression, and he’s clear and earnest, in a way Seth hasn’t seen before.

“You said ‘just for tonight’,” he says.

Stefon makes it sound heavy. He makes it sound like a _plea_. It would be _really_ mean to reject him now, especially when he makes it sound loaded and final, like he knows that this particular delusion is critically low on time.

…N’aw, _fuck_.

Seth feels his face twist involuntarily as his brain wrestles with the decision, until all he can do is allow the fight to leave his body, and let his hand give Stefon’s colder one a quick squeeze. 

“Just for tonight,” he agrees.

The corners of Stefon’s mouth quirk up. His chin is shaking with shivers. But tension vacates his broad shoulders, in time with the visible breath that he exhales into the sky, and it disappears quickly against the cloud cover which the Rockefeller Center’s casting a shadow against.

Seth’s always thought that was a cool thing that happened up here. It’s just _cool_.

He lets go of Stefon’s hand, ignoring the way the other man looks hurt for a split second; he adjusts the borrowed scarf around the taller man's neck, reaching up to silently tell him that he doesn't trust Stefon with his own temperature control. Stefon allows the mothering until Seth's satisfied.

Much better. “You wanna go around the other side?” he asks, and rummages in his coat pockets, “I got some quarters in here somewhere. We could get one of those binoculars working and spy on the creeps in Central Park, if you wanted.”

“How romantic,” Stefon beams.

The worrying part is how he’s not joking, but Seth lets him link their arms and be led over to the north-facing side anyway.

(There’s not a lot of trouble they can get into, from eight hundred and fifty feet above the ground.)


	4. Chapter 4

**Mother’s Day 2011**

It’s before the show, and Seth is hanging out with Stefon. Finding him before one of his appearances has always been a challenge, but it’s not so bad this time around - he’s lurking by the quick-change booths, and somehow blending in with everyone bustling around him.

So Seth sidles up and says, “hi.”

Stefon’s head jerks up; he hurriedly pulls down his sleeves. “Hi,” he says, looking like he just got caught doing something he shouldn’t be.

Best to ignore it. He doesn’t wanna unsettle him before the show.

“You ready to talk about Mother’s Day?”

“Of course I ammm,” Stefon drawls, “what secrets will I impart onto you today? Only the best for Seth Meyers.”

Seth pops his collar and works on his tie. “And how does your mom feel about those secrets?” he asks, flipping the fabric over and under and through.

“They’re not secrets if she _knows_ about them,” he points out. “But… Yes, some of my best suggestions probably wouldn’t jive with Ms Stefon.”

Aha. Surprise information.

Seth wants to ask _so_ many questions about Ms Stefon. He can see Stefon wants him to ask, too, because he’s doing his very best ‘question pause’, but it’s ultimately going to be more satisfying if he utilizes that information on-air.

“Are they gonna jive with Mrs Meyers?” he asks instead. “I’m counting on you here, buddy.”

Stefon perks up. “What’s Mrs Meyers like?”

“She’s a teacher,” he says simply. “No ulterior motives with my mom. She tells you what she expects and she means it.”

“Why don’t you ask _her_ what she wants instead of _me_ , then?” Stefon says, and hides a grin, so Seth gives him a friendly shove and tosses some choice language back his way. Asshole.

There’s a break in their conversation to observe a member of their cast - completely unrecognizable, under a layer of what looks like thick green latex - dragging back a changing curtain with a screech and yelling for assistance. Business as usual in Studio 8H, apparently. Once they’ve finished stifling their laughter, Seth tries to straighten his face and get serious for a sec. Jesus… this childish stuff makes him feel like a mean, cafeteria-lurking highschooler.

He clears his throat. “Hey, Stefon… Can I tell you something?”

Stefon emits a long, wiggly noise, which sounds troublingly like the phrase _ohmygod it’s happening it’s finally happening._

“Wait wait waaait, it’s not whatever it is you’re imagining,” Seth says hastily - someone from wardrobe shoots him a nosy look as she breezes past them, so he lowers his voice and starts again - “I just mean that-- well, it’s about the segment.”

“…Am I getting kicked off?”

“Stop imagining stuff!” Seth says exasperatedly. “I’m getting there, jeez… It’s just, you don’t make me uncomfortable, I guess? I have a _lot_ of guests on Update. So I just wanted to let you know that you’re cool. And not like some of the other people. You might get along with some of them, actually, but for the most part, I’m glad you’re not like them.”

“Like who?” Stefon asks.

“Oh my god,” says Seth, “they once sent me a woman with PGAD, that was crazy. Alex likes to torture me.”

Stefon frames his smile with his hands, and in an extremely strange reversal of roles, says, “what’s PGAD?”

“Persistent Genital Arousal Disorder,” says Seth, through gritted teeth. “ _So_ awkward. We had to throw out that chair!”

As Stefon giggles into his fingers, one of his sleeves slips down his arm, and Seth spots _ink_.

“Holy shit, is that _henna?”_

“Oh,” says Stefon, pulling his sleeve to his elbow - Seth always forgets about how much arm hair he has, it’s so unexpected - and extending his wrist out. “Yeah,” he says, “it’s mehndi, I was at a New Year party a couple weeks ago. It’s almost gone. I hope makeup are cool about it.”

“They will be,” says Seth. There’s a cuff curled around Stefon’s wrist in deep orange, linear and cubed and curving down around the indents of his tendons.

Stefon waggles his eyebrows. “You should see my ankles…”

“ _No_ , Stefon.”

It’s all tolerable until his bullshit-radar picks up some crap down the way. _We’ll get Seth to do it,_ he hears, from across the corridor. _Get him into costume and see what he thinks._

Seth tightens the knot of his tie.

“Sometimes,” he says, “the things you talk about? They can be unsettling, sure. But they can also be _entertaining_ , and I’m never put off by _you_ , so you can relax. In fact, I don’t even mind if you ramp it up. You shouldn’t be holding back your stuff if the audience like you this much.”

Stefon’s eyes widen. “Really?”

“Yeah, really! Alex loves it when we bicker, it makes his writing easier,” Seth grins. “We’re close enough now. I don’t think you can embarrass me too badly… That is, if you feel up to it.”

“Challenge accepted,” Stefon says. It’s instant. His eyebrows have gone all devious.

Oops. Seth realizes with a pang of regret _exactly_ what he just did, but it’s too late to worry about that now - someone’s striding towards him and brandishing a clipboard, so in ten seconds he’ll probably have to shoot down some half-baked plan for next week’s show. “See you up there,” he says, clapping Stefon on the shoulder, and moves to tackle the issue at hand.

It quickly goes south.

Which is kind of not true at all - the segment goes just fine, and it’s as conversationally chaotic as usual. It’s Seth’s _stomach_ that goes south, dropping clean into the basement in two seconds flat when Stefon begins to describe **Uhhhhh** as a ‘bi-curious beach party’. Stefon’s recommendations are getting more specific, but Seth’s not sure if he realizes how good at his job he is.

(Seth’s been trying not to think about his relationships with men lately.)

(...Like, it’s _fine_ when he’s just thinking on other dudes, y’know? He likes sports and his colleagues and his best friends and whatever, and he’s super close with his family, and it’s all good. Occasionally he’ll have a thought about a man looking nice today, or saying something funny and earning respect from him, or he’ll watch how other men interact with people who aren’t _him_. It’s fine.)

(It’s fucking _fine_ , for crying out loud, as long as he doesn’t put _himself_ in those people’s places. If he doesn’t do that, it’s all good. Because once he starts making it personal, his insides decide to take a trip to the core of the earth, and _that’s_ when it starts to get scary.)

“Bad _job!”_

Taking digs at Stefon is easier now they’ve had a discussion about their bickering success. It’s almost like communication in a relationship works.

Huh.

The idea’s still grinding through his skull, like a key digging into the paintwork on the driver’s side door, when Stefon emits a sound that should never have come from him. It seems to be a noise that’s masquerading as a word.

He blinks. “Is that… ‘Spicy’?” 

“ **Spicy** ,” Stefon repeats, and explodes with laughter.

So Seth ‘uh-huh’s his way through the rest of it, because Stefon’s taking weird breaths and it sounds like he’s getting het up about the audience’s attention again. **Spicy** is another place with everything: sand worms, geishas, rock-eaters, a seven level course in adult education. It also has a prime opportunity for Seth to ask about Stefon’s parents - turns out his mom really _is_ called Ms Stefon. And his dad is called ‘David Bowie’, which could mean a number of things:

1) Stefon’s father has the same name as David Robert Jones’s stage moniker;

2) Stefon was conceived during the recording of ‘Heroes’, which is not outside of the realms of possibility;

3) Stefon is lying through the teeth that his tongue’s currently pressed against.

Seth internally opts for the third option. It prefaces flirting, so lies might be part of that package.

“Stefon, look--”

“Oh, I’m _looking_.”

And, well, he is - Seth tries not to double-take too hard. He’s being checked out in a way that feels _tangible_. Plus, he’s worried he might snort _extremely_ loudly at how Stefon’s chest hair is exposed from how his mic’s been clipped on, so glancing over right now is a dangerous game, period.

“I’m asking for your help here,” he says. “I’m going over to my mother’s tomorrow--”

“Uh, don’t you think it’s time we met?” Stefon says indignantly, planting the seed of a disastrous idea without even knowing. (Seth’s starting to think his brain lacks a survival instinct.)

“And I’m taking my girlfriend--”

Stefon loudly boos him.

“And--”

\--And Seth doesn’t get any further than that, because Stefon slides across the desk on his wheely chair to plant a firm kiss on his cheek.

Hmm. “I just have to dart on down to Rockefeller’s vault, so I’ll meet you in the lobby when I’m done in there,” his stomach _doesn’t_ say, because it’s already in a private elevator to the bottom floor of the building.

Seth fights his blush and loses. He fights his impending nervous laughter, and reaches a compromise, through an ‘embarrassed smile’ peace treaty. Good enough.

“I want my mom to have a great day,” he manages to get out, as Stefon channels the surprise of the entire room via his face. “I mean… This woman _raised_ me and changed my diapers.”

Stefon doesn’t let up. “Lucky _lady_ ,” he leers, and for a second, the room disappears, and the back-and-forth feels entirely _theirs_ , despite the raucacious response of the room and the seething flush that’s spreading over Seth’s face.

“ _Ste_ fon,” he grins, quietly, seriously, in a small way that says, _you took this ‘embarrassing me’ thing way too much to heart, didn’t you_.

There’s an irregular moment, slotting into place _far_ too comfortably, where Stefon fans himself and Seth copies his guest’s mouth-covering, an all too familiar mannerism that rests in his hands so _very_ comfortably at the time.

What a mistake… 

_What_ a mistake.

Luckily, seeing as he’s already invited Stefon to more than one holiday celebrations at this point, the idea of a plus-one for Mother’s Day doesn’t feel like a mistake at all.

After they exit the Weekend Update set, having the mics taken from them and being sent over to wrap up their backstage business is the fastest it’s been in forever. Stefon grumpily adjusts the neck of his horrible tee, and then the glimpse of chest hair is gone.

When they’re free to go, Seth nods towards the dressing rooms. They walk with a purpose that could nearly pass for ‘normality’.

“I’ll meet you on 6th Avenue by Bryant Park, then?” Seth asks. 

Stefon is so consumed by delight that he almost walks into a doorframe. “Oh, Seth Meyers,” he swoons, “you meant it! You know I love it when you do your _serious_ thing on me!”

“Yeah, no-one’s doing anything on anyone,” he replies firmly. “No sleepover. But I will see you tomorrow. Is eleven okay?”

“Yesyesyesyes yes! _Yes_.”

Seth reaches the dressing room and twists on his heel. “Cool. We’ll meet you there, buddy. Oh, by the way, one last thing…”

Stefon vigorously nods.

“What exactly was the deal with ‘Spicy’?”

“Adult education!” he says, as though it’s obvious. “You said your mom’s a teacher. I knew you wouldn’t recognize my genius, but it was worth a shot, I guess…”

Seth jabs a finger at him. “You’re not cute,” he says, as a smile brawls its way onto his face, “you’re _not_. I know you _think_ you are - but you’re not.”

“I am,” says Stefon.

“Nuh-uh.”

“Uh- _huh_. I am _very_ cute and about to be _very_ late. So I will see you tomorrow at eleven.”

Seth doesn’t watch him go. Not when Stefon nods, and turns his back. Not when Seth has to be elbowed out of the way by crew members, because there’s chunks of set gliding through corridor thoroughfare.

And _definitely_ not, for just a second or two, through the gaps in the hinges of the dressing room door.

* * *

“I’m sure he’s fine. You worry too much--”

“No, I wanna be clear with you, Mom,” he says, trying to be gentle and firm at the same time, and not really succeeding with either. “He’s kinda full-on, and I’ve never seen him drink before - well, I’m _pretty_ sure he hasn’t been drunk around me, anyway - so if he starts getting too much for you, just let me know, and I’ll tell him to tone it down.”

“Seth!” his mother says.

Seth glares at the gym on the other side of the road. A guy just dragged two whole suitcases through the glassy doors. What a weirdo.

“You think I can’t handle myself?” asks his mom. Indignation radiates from her in chilly waves. “You think I’m not determined to have the _coolest_ Mother’s Day ever? Well, you’d think wrong, buster! I’m tough as nails! I think my credentials for dealing with drunken foolish men are pretty solid, given I _married_ one and raised two more.”

“That’s fair,” Seth admits.

“I taught you everything you know.”

“You did, Mom.”

“Except for being such a wishy-washy _jerk_ sometimes…”

“ _Mom_.”

“You got that from your father’s side.”

Seth lets his eyes flicker over, establishing eye contact without moving his head, and his mom stares right on back. 

“Now we are going to have a _very_ nice day-drinking session,” she says, devoid of doubt and absolutely adamant, “and you’re going to fill me in on what’s been happening in your big city life, and if I end up back at my hotel before midnight then you’ll be demoted to Least Favorite Son. Okay?”

Seth brightens. “Does that mean I’m Most Favorite Son right now?” he asks hopefully.

His mom mulls it over for a second, before responding with a definite-sounding, “no.”

He’s about to retort, because it’s the most opportunistic time of year to fight this particular battle, but something over the block catches his eye. A flurry of movement draws his sight, and--

“Oh, noooo,” he says instead.

Over the way, as Seth peeks through the traffic, he spots a familiar figure in the midst of a Classic New York Argument. Stefon appears to be embroiled in a face off against the driver of a large commercial truck, emblazoned with angry reds and whites. He imagines their heated-looking exchange is just as colorful.

Seth’s mom clutches at his sleeve. “Is that your friend? Is he about to be run down?”

“Yep,” says Seth flatly. The argument reaches a crescendo.

People around the truck are starting to pay attention now, but it all comes to a head in some sort of rock-paper-scissors game, in which Stefon makes a shadow-puppet butterfly shape, and the driver flips the bird at him before driving the wrong way down 41st.

Seth resists the urge to put his face in his hands as Stefon jaywalks over to them.

“Sorry I’m early,” he says, “I was expecting that to take longer. _Hey_ , Seth Meyers’ Mom!”

Stefon waves giddily. He’s wearing a half-beige, half-red Ed Hardy shirt - there’s yellow, blue, and green detailing on it, like a toddler attacked him with poster paints prior to their meet-up - and he’s got a potted plant curled up in the crook of his elbow. Not to mention he’s swapped his usual undershirt for a collection of studded leather bracelets.

(If Seth’s being honest, it’s weird to see him in short sleeves for once. It _is_ May, though… Jeez, he’s never noticed how extensive Stefon’s arm hair is.)

“Hey, buddy. How was your night?”

“The same,” Stefon drawls. He doesn’t so much present Seth’s mom with the plant pot as _shove_ it at her. “I got you something, I hope that’s okay.”

Seth squints. “Did you get my mom a _Venus Flytrap_ for Mother’s Day?” he asks.

“Well, _yeah_ , they’re cool plants that _eat_ things. Like a pet that’s not a pet.”

She’s delighted with it. Seth is surrounded by lunacy. “Oh my goodness!” his mom beams. “Thank you so much! You must be Stefon-- I’m sorry, where should I put the stress in your name?”

“Oh, it doesn’t matter,” Stefon says dismissively. “Some people put it on the _Steffff_ , Seth usually puts it on the _Fonnn…_ ”

With spiking curiosity, Seth frowns. Huh. He hasn’t really thought about it before. “Do you have a preference?” he asks.

“Seth, honey, you can put stress in me _wherever_ you want--”

“ _Oh_ -kay, that’s enough,” he says hastily, “that’s enough. Let’s go.”

6th is busy today. He forgets that Stefon walks in the world’s widest strides, but luckily he seems to have the sense to glide a little more slowly to accommodate everyone else’s legs. Their destination is only a few blocks away, so Seth leads his mother blindly through the waves of tourists pouring out of the subway, and lets her stash her new plant in the safety of her huge handbag.

A bump at his shoulder. He looks up; Stefon’s tilting his head in silent interrogation. 

“The first stop,” he explains, turning them onto 45th, “is a gin bar, because if we’re gonna start this day drinking off right, we’d better start with something Mom loves so she can appreciate it. We might not be able to later.”

“I do love a gin and tonic,” says his mom, at the same time as Stefon’s eyes widen and he says, “day drinking?”

“Take it as slow as you like,” Seth tells him. “Nothing crazy, just keeping a pace and catching up with each other…”

“For now,” his mom adds.

“Mom, please.”

But it’s okay. Everything’s okay. They lounge at a table outside - Seth takes the seat directly in the sun’s glare, because he’s a gentleman, because his mother complains about the heat on her skin and because Stefon’s so pale he glows sometimes - and the first round is gifted to them in no time at all. 

His mom always looks unfairly elegant with a gin and tonic in her hand. “So what have you been up to lately?” 

“Saw The Devil again,” Seth says casually. “He was on back in March, too, apparently he considers me a friend now.”

Mom’s impressed. “Contacts on the inside! That’s good.”

A glass is set against the table: “I know him,” says Stefon. He wipes a bead of condensation from his lip with a vaguely arthritic motion. “That guy’s hilarious, we worked on _18 to Life_ together.”

Apparently, you learn something new and perturbing every day.

“And, uh, the ice rink finally got shovelled a couple weeks back,” Seth continues. “I wonder how much crap they find in the slush afterwards…”

“Probably a ton of cool stuff. They never let me dig around in it, though.”

His mom leans over conspiratorially towards Stefon. “Seth’s girlfriend lost _three_ gold studs in there last year,” she hums.

“She overdressed! I _told_ her not to--”

“Let’s get another,” she decides, and drains her fancy glass. 

Stefon watches the proceedings with quiet glee. He perches in his usual stance - elbows are tucked into his sides apprehensively, chin held high and legs crossed in the knee. 

He doesn’t shake. He fidgets no more than usual. He goes off on extraordinary, information-filled tangents, and he doesn’t hunch his shoulders in. 

He also gets on with Mrs Meyers just _slightly_ too well. 

By the time they get to their second bar, and their fifth or sixth round of drinks, they’ve moved on from the weird and wonderful happenings at the Weekend Update desk, breezed right on by Seth’s embarrassing childhood anecdotes, and crash-landed into questions about Stefon’s life. Seth usually avoids these. It’s just the way they are - they volunteer personal info in increments. It’s the most patient, steady part of how Seth-and-Stefon work together.

Moms be crazy, though.

“She would have been welcome to join us! We should do this next year, you can bring her along,” his mom says, swirling her tonic.

Stefon wriggles from his side of the booth. “I don’t _think_ that’s Ms Stefon’s hottest Mother’s Day ever, but I’ll pose it to her.”

“Did you say she was out of town?” Seth says, in an attempt to divert the conversation away from future celebrating.

It’s a shitty attempt. “Yes,” Stefon says, and doesn’t really take a measured sip of his drink at all. “She’s at my brother’s house in Los Angeles. He and his wife are hosting her.”

Seth cringes on the inside. Oh, boy.

“Well, I think you got the better end of the deal by staying in New York,” his mom remarks, saving the whole damn day in a way only a mom can, and he releases his held breath. “Who wants to spend Mother’s Day frying in L.A.? Not me.”

“Mom _hates_ the atmosphere out west. She always makes my brother go to her house,” Seth murmurs, giving Stefon a nudge, and that seems to make him lighten up a little.

The way out of bar _numero deux_ is significantly unsteadier than the way in. As they’re stumbling their way up Lexington Avenue, Stefon forges a wobbly friendship with some skaters, trying to do kickflips outside the Chase Bank. “No, no, _no_ ,” he admonishes them, and leads Seth and his mom down 51st with them, “you want the railings down here outside the cardiology place, they’re gonna be _much_ better for you--”

“He’s very sweet,” his mom says to him.

Seth accepts it. “You know, I’m not sure that sentence has ever been said about Stefon before.”

“No?”

“There’s usually other words in place of ‘sweet’,” he explains.

“Well, he seems to know the city just as well as you,” she says, “I think together you’d have a complete encyclopedia of where to find everything. Yours are the _boring_ facts, of course--”

“Mom!” he slurs. “Maybe you _would_ have liked Central Park. Damnit.”

“What was Central Park?”

“Right,” Seth starts, “Stefon’s idea of Things Moms Like is ‘flying a human kite’, which is disability discrimination at the _very_ least. Plus the Subway Sleeping Bag… Do you like sitting between two guys in those stupid puffer jackets?”

“Yes,” she says instantly, “is there a way to combine those two? I want to fly someone wearing a puffer jacket.”

“We are literally _never_ going to Central Park again, oh my god.”

They take a second to watch Stefon direct the skaters. The sunset-stained sky has darkened considerably, so now they’re illuminated in streetlight and headlight beams, with only alcohol to fight off the evening breeze.

“Have some _confidence_!” Stefon’s shouting. “Chin _up!_ I don’t wanna see you stalling! You’re a warrior. You’re an _Olympian_. You’re in a swimming pool of piss and you _don’t_ want any to get in your mouth, so _chin up_ \--”

“I think we should have vodka and chasers,” his mom suggests.

And that’s what they do.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summer 2011**

It’s a hell of a suggestion - Seth’s pretty much convinced Stefon won’t agree to it. But they’re both already there to head to the wrap party after the show, so why not?

“You could just, I don’t know,” he shrugs. “…Come pick me up to close the segment off.”

“Oh, sure. I’ll just haul my backpack on set,” Stefon bites.

“It’ll be fun! You can tell the audience about the stop you chose. They’ll love it. Also, I still don’t wholly understand what’s happening, so it’ll be a good explanation for _me_. C’mon, Stefon.”

“I am going to lie to you about _everything_ ,” he huffs, but there’s reluctant agreement in there somewhere that Seth will accept.

_You ready to go, Stefon?_ he bellows, over the closing cheers of an audience who are happy to see them together again, and for the first time, Stefon yells back. It’s an enormous, victorious _YES!,_ and it’s the surest he’s _ever_ sounded on Weekend Update.

Stefon does bring his backpack on set.

(He looks like Dora the Explorer’s baby butch aunt.)

“Can my girlfriend come?” asks Seth, knowing full well that her summer is booked up and getting tickets for tomorrow morning would be impossible. Brilliant, reliable Stefon is as consistently territorial as ever.

Closing up takes a while more than they’d thought - everyone wants to share parting words with Seth, and catch up with Stefon, who’s rather taken aback that he’s become somewhat of a fixture in the studio. It’s well into the night when they rack up to the already-crowded venue. By the time they cram themselves into the wrap party, weaving through the wall of people chatting at the bar, Alex is already sloshed. He throws an arm around Seth and grins toothily at them, pint in hand:

“You two hating each other,” he says, fumbling his words like a wet bar of soap, “has been the _highlight_ of my year.”

“We don’t _hate_ each other,” Seth protests, at the same time as Stefon says, “We’re _deeply_ in love.”

“This is what I mean!” Alex crows. “That vacation stuff was gold, dude.”

“But it’s true,” says Seth weakly.

Alex doesn’t hear him - he’s spotted some other poor bastard to throw his drink down the front of, and he teeters down a self-made path towards the smoking area.

“How long ‘til our flight?”

Stefon peers at the wristwatch belonging to the woman standing next to him. “Five hours.”

“Well, shit,” says Seth, because he’s just realized they’ve stayed a lot longer than he thought they would.

Someone pushes past them towards the bar, and Stefon curls into his side like a force field - running along his outline, but never touching. “We could get outta here,” he says suggestively. “Go back to your place…”

“To pick up our things,” Seth cuts in.

“Just the two of us…”

“Plus the cab driver.”

Stefon snorts. “New York City cab drivers have evolved past the point of needing _peripheral vision,_ Seth Meyers. The backseat is ours for the taking. And we may as well leave, it’s too late for your beauty sleep - I’ll even let you nap on the way to our vacation. Cross my heart.”

He tries not to crack up at the way that Stefon, with utmost seriousness, draws the smallest ‘x’ on his chest ever. “You mean we should go all the way to the airport?” he asks him, playing along for the sake of the scene. “Get on a plane to anywhere, and never look back?”

Stefon shuffles his shoulders playfully. “Exactly!”

“We could fake our deaths.”

“Leave the life of the city behind us.”

“No-one would ever have to know,” Seth adds.

Stefon smiles.

For about three and a half seconds, there’s a worrying moment where Seth considers it as a real option. Everyone wants to run away at some point - why not do it with a friend? But reality washes over him again, as the noise of the bar roars through his ears once more, and he notes the sketch-marks of escaped eyeliner in the crinkles around Stefon’s eyes, and the feeling leaves as quickly as it had come.

He sets his glass down at the nearest table.

“Let’s blow this popsicle stand,” he decides, dragging Stefon out by the elbow with a gleaming grin, and knowing full well he’d only heard Seth say the words _blow_ and _popsicle_.

Airports suck.

Like, obviously they’re even worse at four in the morning. Stefon jumps at the sight of every janitor that passes, and there’s a weird, burning plastic kinda smell coming from the in-building McDonalds, and they steer clear of duty free because there’s apparently been a terrible, terrible perfume bottle tragedy. Seth’s got a headache coming on just from remembering it.

It’s not all bad, though.

“Is that real?”

“Yes’m,” says Stefon. He’s curled into his seat with all the energy of an elderly housecat. “I left all of my fake passports at home.”

Seth’s not sure if he’s joking. He elects to ignore that last part. “I don’t even know how to say this,” he says, squinting at Stefon’s signature page. “Blarzitch? Blazzidge? That’s not even close, I bet. Give me a hand here, buddy.”

“ _Błażej_ ,” Stefon says effortlessly. “The ‘j’ is more of a ‘y’ sound. _Bwa_ -zhay.”

He tries it out. “Stefon Błażej Zolesky. _Jesus_ , that’s a mouthful.”

“You know it,” Stefon winks, and bursts out laughing when Seth mock-glares at him.

Seth’s middle name is ‘Adam’, which is Not Exciting, or even remotely Polish, for that matter. _Bwa_ -zhay, Błażej, now that’s _cool_.

And what’s not cool? In Seth’s opinion, it’s airports; from Stefon’s point of view, it’s landing on a runway. Seth discovers this when he spends the following twenty minutes prying Stefon’s fingers out of the armrests.

**Summer 2011 - Florida**

The first day they spend in Miami is a lot less intense than Seth had been expecting.

By the time they check into the hotel, it’s not even lunchtime. It _is,_ however, around a hundred degrees, and they’re both sweating balls in the Florida heat, and minus the plane nap, Seth’s been awake for almost forty hours. God only knows how long _Stefon’s_ been conscious for.

“Sleep,” he mutters, collapsing onto one of the twin beds face first, and immediately passes out. For five glorious hours, he doesn’t dream.

When he finally peels himself from the sheets, evening’s barely even descended over the Magic City. Clouds are sprayed erratically across the sky like jets of paint. Below their room, people are drifting through the streets - the night is young, real damn young, and apparently some people like to get started early.

Stefon doesn’t look like he’s stirring anytime soon.

Seth leaves him sprawled over a chair - he’s still got his shoes on, for crying out loud, there’s a joke about him not being house trained _somewhere_ in there - and heads for the nearest store to pick up some kind of sustenance.

It’s a relief to have arrived in one piece.

They’d both chosen Miami for the nightlife. Seth had suggested it because it’s sunny and classic and wild, and it’s busy enough that they could always find some kind of dangerous activity to do. Stefon had enthusiastically agreed because he wanted to show Seth how to locate hotspots of dangerous activity.

It’s possible that Stefon would have reasoned this regardless of their destination. He’d definitely remark _something_ along the lines of _‘showing Seth the ropes’_ anywhere in the world.

No wonder he’s so tired all the time. Three day stints without taking a break would do that to a guy, he imagines - Stefon’s a workaholic in that sense. It’s weird to think about. But then, that would make this as much of a recharge-style vacation for him as it is for Seth. They both deserve it. Probably.

So when Seth barges back into their room, grocery bag full to bursting in one arm and keycard in the other, he isn’t expecting for Stefon to be awake.

Or _talking_ to someone.

“I’ve never been before,” Stefon’s saying, “I got to watch all of the people crawl out onto the streets earlier from my window. Emerging from the woodwork, like little… party ants.”

_“Not the sewers, I hope. I’ve had enough of the sewers to last me a lifetime--”_

“Ugh, me _too_ ,” Stefon groans.

Seth stares. “Who the _hell_ are you talking to?” he asks.

Stefon looks up. He’s migrated to his bed, and is lying on top of the covers on his stomach, swinging his legs in the air like a schoolgirl with a crush. (It shouldn’t be cute.) Then he tilts Seth’s iPad towards the door: “your girlfriend called,” he says casually, “so I answered.”

“Oh, _god_ ,” says Seth.

_“Hey, babe. Heard your flight was good.”_

“Yeah,” he calls, closing the door with his ass, “it was like, eight in the morning for you when we landed, so I thought I’d message you later. I hope Stefon hasn’t been threatening you too much.”

 _“He’s been giving me tips on what to avoid in Las Vegas, actually,”_ says Nicole.

Stefon preens. “There was one bullet point,” he says. “It was ‘Las Vegas’.”

What a welcome surprise. “I was expecting you to be more catty,” Seth remarks, ditching the grocery bag and perching on the mattress - Stefon makes a face, and jabs him in the stomach.

_“Be nice.”_

“He started it,” says Stefon, at the same time as Seth says, “I _am_.”

He’s missed Nicole. He wishes she could’ve come on this trip, but unfortunately, ‘til he manages to claw his way over to Nevada, it’s just going to have to wait a couple months. FaceTime would have to do.

Unfortunately, they can’t make the Wi-Fi connection stretch all the way down to the beach. When Miami darkens and the city burns white and orange with light, it’s just Seth and Stefon in the sand - a few bonfires and teenage drinkers, sure, but they’ve tactically picked a stretch of coastline with minimal parties happening on it tonight. Besides, it’s not like they’re going in the ocean, which Seth positively _hates_.

“Your girlfriend knows a lot about fashion,” says Stefon.

“Oh yeah,” Seth says, kicking up a spray of sand with a bare foot, “Nicole did this story a coupla years back, where she looked into some Fashion Week stuff in California. She’s kept up with it ever since. Not really my thing, though.”

“Clearly,” Stefon says drily.

“Un _kind,_ Stefon,” Seth retorts. “If it’s any consolation, I think you probably know more about trends than she does. Nicole’s in it for the brands and stuff. And the businesswear.”

“Formal event wear, yes… You have to be, if you want the wedding dress crowd at **Slice** to like you,” he says.

Ah, yes, the grown men in wedding dresses. How could Seth have forgotten?

Across the beachfront, a group of young gentlemen in tank tops and board shorts appear to be throwing aerosols into a ramshackle firepit. Seth knocks an empty Bud can in their general direction with a lazy toe - the low light is fading, fast, and soon it’ll be just the two of them against the mainstream party crowd. He’s not sure he’s ready for that yet… Maybe by tomorrow, though.

Stefon gently clubs his elbow with the clunky pair of low-tops he’s brandishing. They’ve got rhinestones on them. They look homemade, and they probably are.

“You still don’t like the wedding idea, do you, Seth Meyers?”

“Nope,” Seth says flatly.

“Why nooooot?” Stefon whines, in a way that doesn’t say, _you and Nicole should get married right now!_ , and is more of a noise that says, _how am_ I _supposed to marry you if you don’t like weddings?_

“Because they’re a _lot_ ,” says Seth, “you have to figure out your food, your music, your _dancing_ , your guests, you have to figure out who’s going to be watching-- I’m not even talking about the _proposal_ , holy shit! With the speech and the location and the perfect ring and the everything. God,” he grimaces, “why can’t it just happen when it feels right? Why does everything have to have a fucking _itinerary?”_

“So just do it, then,” Stefon suggests.

Seth barks out a humorless laugh. “Are you kidding? Nicole would _kill_ me. She lives for all that pre-prepared stuff. I just gotta… I don’t know, hype myself up for the inevitable stress of it all, and hope _that_ doesn’t kill me instead.”

Stefon presses his mouth into a thin, thoughtful line. “I can think of better ways to go…”

“Right? It’s like, oh my god, I just really _don’t care_ about getting married right now,” Seth agrees. “And everyone asking me when I’m gonna ask her just makes me feel worse about the prospect. I like how things are _now_.”

“So no Las Vegas getaway?” Stefon says.

Seth glares at him, and from behind them, one of the firepit drunks emits a suitably despondent howl.

“No, me neither,” Stefon says, squaring his shoulders with revulsion. “Not that a quick getaway isn’t appealing… But yes, even Las Vegas is ‘pre-prepared’. I always thought a wedding on the fly should be more, _hmm_ , chaotic? With whatever you have in your pockets and whoever you have on your arm.”

“Who would your guests be?” Seth grins.

“We have an exclusive mailing list,” says Stefon, “half of my best friends can come with fifteen minutes’ notice at _most_. All I’d have to do is send out an alert and they would come _running_ for the event of the decade.”

Seth almost laughs outright - what a goddamned sight that would be to see. Just _imagining_ a flock of Stefon’s club friends stampeding through Rockefeller Plaza is hilarious.

“Sounds dramatic,” he remarks, and Stefon nods.

“What’s a wedding without drama? When I get married, I want to triumph over something,” he says, and veers further towards the shore, where the sand gets wetter and the city can’t quite extend its influence that far. He doesn’t specify if it’s a triumph over loneliness, or oppression, or maybe just getting one over on a club rival. And he doesn’t elaborate further.

“You know, I filmed something about an Extreme Wedding one time,” Seth says.

“Mmm-hmm? And what was that like?”

“Ehh, the priest had a snowboard. I don’t think I want _that_ , either.”

* * *

Stefon goes surprisingly easy on him, club-wise - by which Seth means that they get sufficiently plastered in Normal Bars of Seth’s Choosing, so that when Stefon launches them into his ketamine-fueled black hole of a dimension, it’s less of a shock and more of a, uh, _novelty._

So now they’re sat in a place called **Guaracha** , which Stefon had ferreted out by squinting at a Halloween pop-up store and doing a complicated handshake with one of the seasonal employees. From their booth in the corner, he’s happily throwing back distilled ice water; Seth, on the other hand, has entirely forgotten about his glass of coconut supertonic, because he’s too preoccupied watching the skeleton magicians at work to remember it even exists right now.

“You haven’t slipped me something, right?”

“No, you’re just drunk.”

“Right,” he says. “Just checking.”

Stefon smirks. “It’s all the real thing, my man.”

Across the floor, one of the skeleton magicians unfastens his coat, to reveal a bird nestled between his open ribs. Seth blinks: “oh, god, that’s almost worse,” he mutters, and sips as much supertonic as he can before it starts to burn.

“Why? I’m glad we came here. To Miami,” Stefon clarifies. “That ‘Faux No’ sensation is way more reliable here.”

He watches Stefon sit up straighter - arching his back, crossing his legs at the knee, waiting for Seth to let loose the magic words.

“What’s ‘Faux No’?”

“It’s that _thing_ ,” he beams, “where you have the sudden realization that everything is Not What It Seems?”

“And fake, instead?” Seth asks. He receives a rapid nod of agreement. Okay, then: “can you give me an example?”

“Okay, so,” Stefon says, suddenly animated, “like, everyone has a friend who’s into those immersive kidnapping experiences, right? You know, the ones where men and women in balaclavas wrap you in duct tape, and pull a burlap sack over your face, and yet they’re somehow stupid enough to leave all of their prominent tattoos on display.”

“Okaaaay,” says Seth.

Stefon shifts in his seat. “Well,” he says, “sometimes it’s not… that.”

“Stefon,” Seth says slowly. “Dude, did you get _abducted_?”

 _“Slightly,”_ he replies, pinching a thumb and forefinger together, and oh my god, Seth’s in Miami with a _lunatic,_ and said lunatic has no sense of self-preservation whatsoever.

“Stefon! That’s not something you should be okay with!”

“But I am,” he says proudly, “it was a valuable learning experience. The point is that in Miami, you’d be able to tell what was happening from how shitty the Spanish was. It’s much more plastic here… New York is _waaaay_ harder to suss for that kind of thing, we’re _very_ convincing.”

“Do _not_ get us abducted.”

“I won’t!” Stefon protests. He hands his empty drink to a skeleton waiter, who unhinges his mandible, pops the glass inside, and makes it disappear.

Seth waves for another round. He has a feeling he might need it.

“Okay, so you like it here,” he says, trying to get them back on track - he’s heard enough about Faux No, _thank_ you. “But if you could go anywhere… Where would you wanna go?”

“Havana,” says Stefon instantly.

“ _Jeez_ , that was fast. How come?”

“Because there’s so much there I’ve never seen before!” Stefon says wistfully. “That place could have everything. Multicolored streets… Giant, indoor statues… _Mosaic houses_. And if you think I’d pass up the chance to drink rum in a big, ruffle-y skirt, then you would be _completely_ mistaken, Seth Meyers.”

“Yeah,” nods Seth, “you’re _exactly_ that kinda man. Wouldn’t doubt you for a second, buddy.”

Stefon pushes his palm into his chin. “I’ve _always_ wondered what it would be like there. My neighbor has a dog that’s part Havanese, I always thought a Cuban dog would be neat.”

“Dogs are great, period,” Seth grins.

“Yeah.. I don’t like to see it lonely,” says Stefon, “I’ve never heard it make any noise, not once, and the people in the building aren’t, well… _In the building_ much. I know, like, a billion dog-friendly clubs, but my neighbors never seem to be enthusiastic when I suggest a night out…”

“I can’t imagine why,” Seth says, over the drone of ‘death salsa’ music, as he shoots a glance at the horde of bone people who are _somehow_ wearing bow ties.

“My turn,” Stefon says. The fact that they’re playing some sort of game is news to Seth. “Where would you _never_ go?”

“Mmmmmmexico,” says Seth, whose alcohol-addled brain almost changed his answer, but eventually decided to stick with it.

 _“And what’s a Mexico?”_ Stefon asks, in a startlingly good impression of Seth’s Weekend Update questioning. Despite using the phrasing incorrectly, he even manages to nail down the way Seth would whip his head into profile.

“You mean what’s _in_ Mexico. I imagine it’s where your Faux No kidnapping would have ended up,” Seth says drily.

They’re interrupted by the arrival of fresh drinks. Stefon gives thanks by way of another erratic handshake.

“Seriously, though,” Seth continues, after they both take a cool and refreshing first sip, “I can’t go there, I promised my brother I wouldn’t without him. We’re thinking of going for his fortieth birthday.”

“I don’t know a _single_ person who’s planned for their _fortieth birthday_ ,” says Stefon, with a curl to his lip, as though the idea of that much time disgusts him. “Most of us just assume we’re going straight to Hell… Or **Heeyyyyy!** , if it’s still there, it’s kinda the same thing. If I could go to Cuba, I wouldn’t _wait_ for it, I don’t think.”

Yeah, that sounds about right for Stefon.

An idea strikes Seth out of nowhere, like a frisbee to the face on a walk in Central Park.

“You know…” he says slowly, and raises his eyebrows. “Miami has a Little Havana.”

Stefon is suddenly _much_ more attentive.

“Mmm?”

“…We could go,” Seth suggests.

* * *

Little Havana goes by in a hurricane of LED lights, fast paced melodies, swing rhythms, and an acute awareness of how a human being breathes. In and out. Four-in-the-morning breezes, chilled to perfection.

He’s not sure how he got back to the hotel.

But that’s okay. Now he’s armed with bottled water he bought from the store across the street, and he’s just about aware enough to cart it back to the room.

Stefon might like a strong entrance, he thinks.

So Seth busts through the door like the fucking Kool-Aid Man.

“Heeeeey!” says Stefon, with pure delight - he’s sat in the corner of the room eating chips from the bag, which is also still in the grocery bag. It’s like his Lays are wearing a paper coat.

“Hey!” Seth calls back, flailing a pointing finger at him and rapidly crashing. “I got water. You know, in case I start to die later. You’re indestructible, I’m sure you’ll be okay--”

Stefon looks very pleased with himself. “Still singing, still dancing, _late_ into the night, honey,” he says, and tears into the wrap like a man dying of thirst. “Aieaieaie. These chips are saltier than the rejects from my sister-in-law’s bridal party…”

“Singing and dancing, huh?” slurs Seth. “I can still do that! Pick a year, any year, I’ll do it--”

“Because you were there?”

“No!” he argues, “because I’m just that _good_ , Stefon! Check this out, I’ll do seventies. _NIGHT FEVER, NIGHT FEE-VUHHHH--”_

“Seth Meyers…” Stefon giggles.

 _“We know… mmrhmm muhh huh!”_ he finishes, because he doesn’t know the lyrics very well, and to be honest, even if he did, he’s _well_ past that point. “Y’know? Whatever. I’m gonna go lie down.”

Holy shit. Cold sheets against scalding skin? If Seth had any sense about him right now, this would turn him on. _Christ._ As it is, some strictly platonic physical contact would probably feel amazing right now, and he wonders where he can get some. Starbursts of light are spreading in white hot circles under his skin, and when he presses his face into the pillow, Stefon’s musical hysteria zigzags into his ears like water.

He turns over.

As suspected, Stefon’s stifling a laugh behind his cupped hands.

“Seth Meyers, you are _soaring_ \--”

“Oh, shut _up,_ ” Seth bites back, “like you’re one to talk. The one time you’re not wearing an Ed Hardy shirt, it _still_ manages to have animals that look like they’re alive on it.”

“It is a _custom embroidered tie-dye tee_ ,” Stefon corrects him. “There’s a drag queen who specialises in embroidery at **Trash**. _Every_ seamstress needs a clothier, and Elizabeth Tailor is the _best_.”

It’s a pretty good shirt. Stefon’s are usually customized in some way - he’s fond of spraying out Ed Hardy’s signature, for one - but this one takes the cake. It’s navy blue and bleach-white, in tied-off horizontal stripes, with silver studs falling across Stefon’s broad shoulders that reflect little shiny beams in every direction. Royal purple thread runs across the chest in interrupted lines. A great white shark, baring spindly teeth at the waves of fabric, swims straight on through.

It’s _exactly_ his style.

Seth means it in the best way ever… But god, Stefon’s so fucking _weird_.

More starbursts under his skin announce that _the world is moving now, thank you! Stand clear of the closing doors._ Abruptly, he’s hit with dizziness, like he’s falling into himself, or maybe phasing through his own skull.

“Hey. Come here,” Seth says, making crab hands in front of him.

“What?”

Seth doesn’t know how to explain that he needs someone to be close to him, like, ten seconds ago - not without it sounding like a weird come-on, anyway - so he settles on saying, “just-- come _here_.”

To his initial surprise, it works.

Unfortunately, Stefon arranges himself as though he’s sharing a twin-size coffin with Seth Meyers’ corpse.

“Aw, c’mon,” Seth whines, because having a slab of marble as a bedmate is _extremely_ unappealing. “Don’t make me turn over… I _hate_ being big spoon, it hurts my shoulder.”

Stefon instantly curls into his side. “The man hates spooning?” he breathes. “Interesting. _Very_ interesting.”

“Old injury,” Seth mumbles. His left side is warm with Zolesky body heat. “I’ve played street hockey since I was a teenager. Bust up the top of my arm one time… Slept on my back ever since.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Stefon flirts.

Seth makes a grumbling noise and stretches his legs out. “It gets uncomfortable stuck under me for too long!” he complains. “I don’t like it.”

“But you _so_ like being spooned,” says Stefon teasingly, “you’re just, like, a chopstick instead of real cutlery.”

“Sure,” says Seth. “Why not. I’ll be a chopstick. I love noodles.”

“You won’t in about six hours,” Stefon advises, quiet and whispery above Seth’s crown. “But then you _will_ again six hours after _that_. I’ll find the hottest party down 163rd and we can stop for Reckless Ramen Bowls. Now _there’s_ a trip you won’t forget in a hurry!”

Needy for weight on his chest, Seth pulls Stefon’s arm over him. The pressure’s fucking _divine_ against his thudding pulse. Stefon doesn’t say anything, so Seth rubs his fingers over the outside of his elbow, haphazardly brushing over Stefon’s arm hair, jerkily moving back and forth. Ordinarily, this would be a comforting motion, but while high, he moves a little like an accelerating car with the handbrake still on.

“I bet you’re a pro at dealing with side effects,” Seth mumbles.

Then, after a second, he tacks on a quick _no offense._

“None taken. I _am_ very good at knowing the risks,” Stefon confirms. “My penmanship is terrible, but I do get a lot of writing finished after a good night.”

Huh. “What about, like, the shakes?” says Seth. 

“The what?”

“Shakes. Like, when you first came on Weekend Update, you were always rubbing at your hands and dabbing at your face and stuff,” he explains, “you were so _tense_ all the time, I’m pretty sure you could’ve cracked walnuts between your shoulder blades. For the record, you handled it like a champ.”

To his surprise, Stefon bursts out laughing.

“Oh, honey, no,” he giggles, “that was the _opposite_ of high! That was withdrawal. I used to be on a Skittles’ bag worth of uppers when I first got invited back. Cutting them out was a _bitch_.”

Seth manages to let his head loll towards Stefon’s general direction.

“I’m sorry?”

“Withdrawal,” he repeats.

“But you were nervous and shaky,” Seth says dumbly. “Your eyes were like manhole covers.”

“Because of _withdrawal_. I’ve never been anything but sleep deprived on Weekend Update,” Stefon says, with a certain degree of pride, and it’s _true_ , because he’s high and calm and completely comfortable with himself right now. “Well, I was _technically_ still coming down from Smileys during the Christmas song with like, the robot voice man? And the lady with drapery hooks in her ears? But that barely counts.”

“It doesn’t,” Seth agrees. He’s beginning to understand why ladies in old-timey literature could faint from shock.

With no regard for Seth’s shattered worldview, the barrage continues. The memory of the studio seems to have set Stefon on a course of chronological recollection. “That third time I came on, after summer, I’d spent the week before practically _nuking_ myself with N-Bombs,” he says. “One of my friends kickstarted a pop-up club in a movie theater… I lived in the projection room of Screen 6 for two whole days. It was wonderful. Then I got to Studio 8H, and I was sober, and it _still_ looked like a colorful dream… I wanted to stay there _forever_. Y’know?”

Seth knows.

“Then after I stopped taking as much, I just… I never came on without coming _down_ first. Didn’t wanna risk getting you in trouble. Any more than I already do, anyway.”

“Well, that’s never gonna happen,” Seth says firmly, “there’s been a _bunch_ of guests who’ve made appearances in states they shouldn’t have been in. Hell, I’ve seen people who got _fired_ get re-hired within the year, yknow? I wouldn’t let you get in trouble anyway. Can you _imagine_ if you ended up doing your thing on another anchor’s segment?”

“HBO,” Stefon nods.

“I wouldn’t be able to stand it,” he snorts, “I get jealous too easily, for a start. A rival is too volatile. I know where I sit with you--”

“On the right, yesyesyes--”

“--and I don’t like being left out, and I _definitely_ don’t like being replaced,” he finishes. He gives Stefon the laziest, most half-assed poke in the world: “stop _worrying_ about getting kicked off the show, buddy.”

“That’s not all it is… I didn’t want to screw anything over,” he murmurs.

“Why not?” says Seth, as a spike of concern burns through his lungs - it’s not like Stefon to make a remark about screwing _anything_ without the accompanying posture he likes to take up. The one that says, ‘ _yes, I went there, and I will_ _continue_ _to go there! And mark my words… we will_ _all_ _enjoy the ride in the end’_.

Instead, Stefon’s gaze drifts over to the other bed, and comes to rest on the sheets there.

“I wanted to meet you,” he says. “The first time… I wanted to meet you.”

Seth tries to remember to breathe for a hot sec.

“Shit,” he eventually settles on, because what are you supposed say to that? He doesn’t even know where to start, so after a second, he decides to go with comedy’s Old Faithful - self-deprecation. “Did you walk in, take one look at me, and think, _holy crap, that’s the first guy to ever have negative knowledge about New York’s Hottest Clubs!”_

“Yep,” Stefon snorts, and allows his shoulder to have Seth’s face buried against it. The studs of his t-shirt are weirdly cold. “But then, I also definitely have a type, so I was determined to introduce myself properly.”

“Which you did by telling me about homeless people bubble baths,” he says.

“ _Yes._ It’s all part of my mastermind plot to steal your heart away, Seth Meyers… Even if your girlfriend did turn out to be unfortunately nice.”

“Not gonna happen,” he mumbles, and finally feels his breathing begin to even out.

The way the mattress dips under Stefon’s weight is reassuring to Seth’s drugged-out thought process, and he tilts his head away from the emerging sunlight. Stefon smells of coconut moisturizer. Even though he knows he’ll wake up with circles imprinted on one side of his face, Seth can’t help but feel sleepy.

He drifts off before he thinks to ask Stefon what his type actually is, and doesn’t bring it up in the morning. His head is pounding _far_ too hard for him to remember to.

**Summer 2011 - NYC**

A few things happen on the way back to New York.

The first is the Long Pine Key Nature Trail, which Seth wanted to do, and which Stefon didn’t protest against too much. When they were there, he actually ended up finding a lot of material for nightlife ideas.

“See? This is what the outdoors will do for you,” Seth had tried to explain. “It’s inspirational. Gets the blood moving. All that fresh air, these beautiful views, the hot sun on your back--”

“These trees look like prison bars from a jail that, like, stretches on forever, because you were sentenced to wander the forest for all eternity...”

“Okay, buddy, that’s enough tree talk for now.”

Seth guesses that he brought it on himself, with all the waxing philosophical he’d done through the hike. How hiking helps lower your blood sugar as well as burn calories. How being in the open air, being in the heart of nature, unplugged and disconnected, is better for your mind, because it frees you from the stress triggers and provocations of modern life.

“You don’t have to carry all those distractions with you - you can just let them go,” he’d suggested, and then he’d put his foot down on an uneven patch of hard dirt, skidded awkwardly, and gone down like a sack of potatoes.

Above him, Stefon had put his hands on his hips and made a _‘hmmmmm’_ noise.

“...Little help, here?”

“I don’t know,” he’d said, “I’m not supposed to be picking things up, I’m supposed to be letting them go.”

“I don’t need you to be a dick right now,” Seth had told Stefon’s shoes. “I just need a hand.”

Stefon had had a surprisingly strong grip, and sunburn dusting the bridge of his nose. “I don’t think you’re going to be carrying _anything_ for a little while, now, Seth Meyers,” he’d said, bursting into fits of giggles when Seth had clicked possibly every vertebra in his spine back into place. All he’d been able to do after his (literal) slip-up was piss and whine, and try to walk it off.

Maybe the city isn’t so bad after all. People adapt to their surroundings - he’s not exempt from that.

The second thing is Stefon sending his girlfriend a postcard detailing the event, because he’s a shit of a human being. At some point they must have exchanged addresses, because Stefon doesn’t have a cell phone. Presumably this happened because he and Nicole share a common interest of ripping into Seth’s pride.

“Is that a _comic,_ Stefon?” he asks incredulously.

Stefon draws frowny eyebrows onto a stick figure with a crooked back and a big tuft of hair. “It’s a storyboard,” he corrects. “She needs to know how it went down. How _you_ went down.”

“Do _not_ put that sentence in writing,” he warns, “it sounds terrible,” and Stefon _does_ write it down, and Seth applies the frowny eyebrows to real life, and three days later Nicole texts him a photo of the postcard stuck to her refrigerator.

The third thing is when they finally make it to Daytona Beach. Yeah, they do the stuff Seth thinks they should do - who wouldn’t take advantage of eating taffy and drinking margaritas on the pier? It’s a no-brainer. But they also dip down to a rave Stefon picked up on, where the fireworks go off a mere ten feet from the ground, and continue for a whole hour afterwards.

It had everything - pod racers, a beachside masseuse team, a suburban grandma in aviators making Horatio Caine puns - and it was located in a cove you could only reach between the hours of eleven and five.

Seth sees three separate people puking on their way in, and thinks, _messy_.

Stefon swipes an unlabelled bottle from an oiled up man in overalls - one of the pod racers - and says, “fancy!”

“Why is this fancy?”

Stefon pops the cork with his thumb like a pro, and after a quick swig, he chases the escaped droplets with his fingertips. “Because look,” he says, and juts his chin towards a tremendously large, long snake hanging from a stalactite.

“Jesus Christ!”

“Live animals,” Stefon continues, like Seth hadn’t just had his soul frightened out of his body. “They’re hard to feature at a club--”

“Because of the license you need to own them?” Seth asks hopefully.

Nope. “They’re fancy because you have to _really_ smuggle them in,” says Stefon, passing the bottle. “Trench coats are too suspicious, you have to dress them up like Cyndi Lauper.”

Seth takes a bigger swig than necessary - he was expecting champagne, but it’s some kind of alcoholic syrup - and seriously considers how much he now knows about the underground club scene. It’s more than the average human.

Which is a remarkably worrying idea. (He tries to justify it to himself as a survival technique.)

The last thing is when they make it back to New York.

Their flight gets in during the early hours of the morning; Seth passes out for the entire journey, and when he’s shaken awake, they’re almost the last ones left on the plane.

“Shit, sorry,” he says groggily, peeling his face from the side of his seat.

“It’s okay. You’re a little older, it’s understandable that you get tired more easily--”

Seth glares at Stefon, who’s stood in the aisle wearing his little backpack with pride.

“It’s not an insult,” Stefon says. His smile is all teeth. “I _like_ it.”

Seth hauls himself out of his chair, to the sound of outright laughter when he winces at that one fucking muscle in his back. “I _just_ woke up,” he protests, “can you at least wait until I’ve got my luggage back to wound, flirt with, or mock me?”

(To be fair, his back isn’t that bad. It simply, like most good comedy, waits for the most inopportune time to announce its presence.)

Seth’s got the upper hand at the moment, anyway, because he has one last thing up his sleeve before their vacation ends. Stefon doesn’t question it when they grab a taxi and it swings by Seth’s place, but he does look suspicious when Seth only drops off his case and then gets back in.

It’s alright for him. Stefon didn’t bring a case. Seth did, and he doesn’t really want to bring it along to their field trip.

“Do you remember Top of the Rock?” he asks, as they turn onto State Street.

Stefon goes fleetingly starry-eyed. “Ohhhh… How could I _forget_? I love heights.”

“Well,” says Seth, “you’re about to experience a pretty good elevation, so I hope you’re ready.”

It’s a surprisingly quiet morning - just some Tuesday in June, before the tourists mob all the best sites and piss off the locals - and it’s warm and sunny and clear, and Stefon’s eyes are like dinner plates as he processes what’s about to happen. They’re standing across from a sign directing them into Battery Gardens. And they’re directly underneath a CityPass ad, with Lady Liberty’s face emblazoned proudly in green.

“Sound good?” Seth asks.

Stefon steeples his fingers, brushes down the front of his shirt, tidies his hair, and adjusts one of his rings, the one with the skull design, in that exact order. “Oh my god,” he says eventually, “I’m running on two hours’ sleep and half a menthol and I’m about to pop my Liberty cherry.”

“Don’t… don’t call it that. Wait, when did you smoke a menthol? I’ve been here the whole time!”

Stefon discreetly stubs out a cigarette. “Are we getting the ferry over?” he asks, tossing it in the garbage.

“Of course we’re getting a ferry over,” Seth says, and leads the way. “I wasn’t gonna make you _swim_. And it’s as much a part of the experience… You think I’d miss out on you trying to keep your hair in place when we’re crossing the border?”

With a feline smile, Stefon strokes a finger down Seth’s arm - who jerks backwards, ticklish and amused - and lets him lead the way through the Battery. “I’ve only seen it from the park viewpoint,” he chatters, “we had this motionless rave there one time, you get covered in UV and you have to sit as still as possible, I stared at it for seven straight hours…”

And Seth lets him keep talking, as they navigate their way through tickets and queues and safety procedures. Stefon only loses his breath again when they’re about to board the ferry.

He actually looks a little apprehensive, like he’s just figured out that what’s happening is for real, so Seth decides to break the tension and crack out a dumb British guy routine.

“My good man,” he says grandly, leaning on the railings and offering his hand, “if I may--?”

Stefon brightens instantly. _“I’ll allow it,”_ he says, in his best Law & Order voice, and accepts the assistance. Seth daintily pulls him onto the ferry ramp like he’s helping royalty up onto stage.

“Have you seen _Titanic_ , Stefon?”

“Nuh-uh.”

“Okay,” Seth says, relieved, “just checking.”

When the ferry leaves, Stefon stands by the flag, clinging to the rails and eyeing the water suspiciously as Manhattan gets smaller. Seth spares a glance. His strange friend, with his bizarre fashion choices, and willingness to try anything and everything, and how he can be so unexpectedly shy.

Stefon is six-foot-something of non-straight, barely-gendered self-awareness, and Seth thinks, as the stars and stripes flutter behind him, that he really likes how Stefon is everything America is _supposed_ to stand for. Because he just exists. There aren’t enough hyphenated descriptors in the universe to contain him.

The head of the Statue of Liberty does a pretty good job of that, though.

“Were you sitting on this since Top of the Rock?” Stefon asks him, one hand pressed to the arched windows.

“Yeah,” Seth says, hoping he’s downplaying it enough. “You said you’d never been. And I said I’d come with you, so…”

“You said you’d _take_ me.”

“Not like that,” he says quickly, meaning it in multiple ways.

Stefon stops waggling his eyebrows. “We are here, though,” he beams, and it’s true, they’ve ended up inside the Statue of Liberty at nine-thirty on a Tuesday, sleep-deprived and giggly and fresh off a plane. 

He’s full of weird pride at being able to show this to him for the first time. 

“They’re like tiny, liberated pill bugs,” Stefon says. He’s peering down at the base of the monument. “Look at them. Teeny little… roly-polies of _freedom_ …”

Seth knocks his shoulder, and peers out through the same pane.

“They do look pretty small from up here, huh?”

“Mmm-hmm,” hums Stefon, and stands a shade closer to him than necessary.

After they finish touring Liberty Island, and take the ferry back to Manhattan - Stefon is still mesmerized and horrified with the prospect of crossing the water - the vacation finally starts to come to a close.

“You’re South Ferry Station, right?”

“Yes’m. But you’re not,” Stefon frowns, “you must be on the 4 train--”

“Yeah,” Seth grins. One of the best parts of being friends with Stefon is that they both know NYC like the backs of their hands - it’s nice to bounce thoughts off someone with the same internal map as you.

“Then I’ll walk you,” Stefon decides, and even though Seth protests for a whole block, his choice remains firm.

The station isn’t deserted by any stretch, but it’s remarkably calm. There’s a gaggle of kids on the other platform, tapping out rhythms and gossiping amongst themselves, and a few patrons on their end that are avoiding a bold New York City rat from introducing itself.

“C’mon, Stefon,” Seth grimaces, because Stefon doesn’t care about a little thing like _that_. He’s already crouching down and wiggling his fingers, making kissy-noises in an attempt to lure it over.

“What?”

“It’s a subway rat! You don’t know where it’s been.”

“It doesn’t know where I’ve been, either,” Stefon grouses, but he stands upright anyway. “I could have all sorts of rodent-specific, Floridian cooties, but _some_ of us are polite enough not to bring it up.”

It doesn’t seem wise to start an argument about how if Stefon has Florida cooties, then Seth almost certainly picked up some of them as well, so he stifles a smile and keeps on waiting for the train. The kids on the other platform have started singing something. He strains his hearing to listen in - weirdly enough, it’s almost like a nursery rhyme. A few people on their platform are humming along, which is both unexpected and completely endearing. 

It’s the kind of thing that makes him realize that he’d had a good time on vacation… But he’d also missed New York more than he’d thought, too. It’s nice to be home. 

_When we arrive, sons and daughters..._

“What date is it?” Seth asks.

Stefon shrugs. Well, that’s exasperating, but’s it’s certainly not _surprising_ , so Seth pulls it up on his cell.

“Let’s see what’s going on tonight,” he murmurs.

The kids have started dancing, now.

Suddenly, he understands why their song has that nursery rhyme quality - they’re singing it in a round, like ‘Row Row Row Your Boat’ or ‘Frere Jacques’. It doesn’t sound bad, either.

“Oh, here we go… There’s a concert at the Bandshell later,” he says, holding his screen up jubilantly. “Cute. Bet you ten bucks they’re all heading to the zoo for the day.”

Stefon sneaks a look at Seth’s browser, before visibly deciding that he approves, and tapping a shiny shoe to the beat.

 _When we arrive, sons and daughters // We’ll make our homes on the water_ _  
_ _We’ll build our walls aluminum // We’ll fill our mouths with cinnamon…_

“So what are you doing when you get back?”

“Oh, you know,” Stefon says, airily waving a hand, “catching up on pre-bookings, judging that talent show, fretting over my neighbor’s mute dog… The usual.”

“Dog? The Cuban one?”

“Yesyesyes,” says Stefon, and rolls his eyes, “am I _allowed_ , Seth Meyers? Or do you think I might catch Apartment Puppy Leprosy from it, or something?”

“It was a _subway rat_ , you shouldn’t touch it!” Seth bites back, arguing through his huge smile. He has to raise his voice because the train’s approaching. The rattling grows nearer, and drowns out the kids on the other side.

Stefon lowers his lashes.

“Thanks for everything, Seth,” he says. “I had a great summer.”

And on an impulse, on a stupid whim that he doesn’t want to think about for too long, Seth pulls him into a fierce embrace and knocks the breath out of both of them.

It’s quick. For a second, all he does is smile against the exposed skin of Stefon’s neck, as the train roars into existence behind them, and then he pulls back because he’s got to _leave_ and he doesn’t want to go, not yet.

“Thanks for coming with me,” he says firmly, and the train grinds to a stop. “You’ve still got some summer to burn - it’s not over yet. Be safe, buddy.”

“Always,” says Stefon, who hugs warmly and hits on him with even more heat, and never feels very safe at all. 

Then Seth boards the train.

When it pulls away again, Stefon raises one hand in a very small, very still farewell. Seth only catches a glimpse of the freeze frame for a second, before he’s too far down the track to see.


	6. Chapter 6

Seth has fleeting contact with Stefon after their vacation. His friend’s supposedly juggling a boatload of work, given that it’s summer and the club scene is in full swing - Seth’s actually tried to ferret out some kind of news outlet that reports on club culture, but he can’t find one that mentions _anything_ about the kind of world Stefon lives in.

About two weeks after Florida, though… Damn.

“Hey, Nicole. You okay? You don’t usually call the apartment--”

_“You weren’t answering your cell. You haven’t heard, have you?”_

Seth sits up. Oh, shit. The material he’s been working on slips off his lap and onto the carpet.

“Heard what?”

 _“Oh, stop panicking. I just figured that it was too quiet on the line for almost eleven at night if you’d heard,”_ Nicole says. _“The same-sex marriage bill passed.”_

“Are you serious?!”

 _“Yeah,”_ she says - Seth pushes the handset into the crook of his neck and heads for the window - _“33-29, I’d give anything to be out there reporting on it! I bet the Stonewall Inn is a glorious hub of insanity.”_

“Yeah, I might give Lower Manhattan a wide berth for a couple days,” Seth murmurs.

He can just about see the Empire State from his apartment building. It’s been lit up in rainbow colors for a few days now, appropriately decorated for a week of Pride, but now it’s… more symbolic, he supposes. A little more poignant. Standing tall above the city, like an usher’s torch.

_“I’m surprised Stefon didn’t drag you out there.”_

He finally spots his cell phone, wedged between the couch cushions, so he pries it free and switches on the screen.

 **(212) 206-9105** **  
****Missed call (104)**

He pulls up his laptop and punches it in.

“I think he’s trying to, y’know.”

_“Oh yeah?”_

“Yeah,” Seth sighs, “I have over a hundred missed calls from a payphone in Greenwich Village.”

_“Only a hundred? He’s losing interest, babe.”_

“Stop it,” Seth snorts.

 _“I cannot and will not stop,”_ says Nicole, and he can hear her talking through a big fucking grin, _“he’s the coolest friend you’ve ever had, and he also agreed in his last letter to me that he’d help with my project on the casting agency scoop.”_

“You guys are writing regularly now?”

 _“Oh, yeah, I asked if we could be penpals. Plus,”_ she adds, _“I can, y’know, sort of totally see why he’s into you.”_

“Can you,” he says flatly. There’s some livestreams of the Stonewall Inn floating around on Twitter, so he opens one to watch in the background.

_“I certainly can, yep. Seeing as I agree with him on most of them…”_

Seth huffs so hard that it blows out the receiver. “Stefon’s into trim old men, that’s not the compliment you think it is,” he complains, and Nicole’s laughter rings in his ears like pretty tinnitus for the rest of his evening, long after they hang up.

**October 2011**

He doesn’t see Stefon again until the new season's started. It _sucks_. Seth doesn’t even manage to run into him before the show, so the first time they speak again is actually on air.

(Which is always, to put it mildly, _risky._ )

But they’ve been through the motions enough times by now. Seth’s fully prepared now to be shocked and appalled at the prospect of all of Stefon’s suggestions, so he’s psyched to be able to have a back-and-forth with him tonight. It’s been too long. He likes to play by the rules they’ve established with each other… What can he say? 

“Hi, Stefon,” he says, hoping to ease his guest back into the limelight gently. “That was _some_ vacation we took this summer.”

Except the first thing Stefon says ends up knocking him for six.

“How’s your back?” he asks, and the audience _roars_.

Seth glides past it as seamlessly as he can manage. At least _he_ knows that it’s secretly a jab at Seth’s ‘boring’ activities, and not the tongue-against-teeth implication that the audience have interpreted it to be. He doesn’t know what he expected, _honestly._

And the mimicking _definitely_ didn’t make that list.

At the mere mention of ‘a shaved lion that looks like Mario Batali’, Stefon sets himself into a suppressed fit of giggles - except that image is actually pretty funny, given that Seth’s now armed with the knowledge that animals give clubs a fancier reputation. So he finds himself trying not to laugh, too. He catches sight of both of them, with their elbows on the desk and their fingers over their mouths as the audience lose their minds, and hopes he can rescue the segment.

Seth’s been told he has to at least _try_ to be mad at Stefon for not delivering. His writer Alex had said to him that _it gets better ratings_ with an unattractively stern expression - now there’s a need for a more dedicated attempt at decorum. (Even though Seth finds Stefon intriguing and nastily endearing and could listen to his delirium-listicles forever).

So when Stefon explains Human Fire Extinguishers, he slips in a bit about the New York Chamber of Commerce. As a news anchor, of _course_ he knows that it’s called the New York City Partnership now. He’s secure in the assumption that Stefon will probably pick up on it, because his encyclopedic knowledge of NYC is extremely thorough.

 _Codes_. It’s a symbol of true friendship. (Or something.)

Then he mentions that he’s taking Nicole to a bed and breakfast, which is completely true. (They’ve been looking forward to it for a while, actually.)

And though he knew Stefon would be moderately disappointed, he didn’t…

Well, he hadn’t expected _Zoolander_.

 **STEFON’S NEW FRIEND** , the crawler bar reads. He regrets telling Stefon on their vacation that he’s probably more prone to jealousy than him, because that’s… also true.

Oh, Alex is _so_ dead. Seth's gonna have his head writer _gruesomely murdered._

On one hand, he likes to think he passed a test by accurately calculating the location of **SoWoHoNoBoHeWo**. But he can’t help but be annoyed with how Derek Zoolander doesn’t know the difference between ‘tourists’ and ‘terrorists’, or how he advocates for prescription drug abuse on his segment (which could genuinely get Weekend Update into trouble), or how Stefon sits so _close_ to him, because-- because he can tell himself it’s ‘unprofessional’ all day long, but it doesn’t change the fact that Seth’s just plain fuckin’ green-eyed about it.

“I think we’re done here,” he says curtly, cutting off the Hitler excuses. “I think we’re done.”

“What’s the matter, Seth Meyers?” asks Stefon. He suddenly turns sharp: _“jealous?”_

“I’m not jealous!” Seth bites back instantly, “I’m _not_!”

Hoo, boy, he is.

Seth really hopes Nicole doesn’t see this. He’ll never hear the end of it.

(God, they _just_ got past his hair beginning to gray.)

There’s a lot to unpack in the remains of the interview - for example, Seth’s pretty sure he won some points back when Zoolander inevitably slipped up. Not only did he call Stefon’s _Rigor Mortis_ look ‘not sexy’, but he also kinda implied that Seth’s pouty, stupid-looking expression _is_ sexy. Which is… weird.

He’s still seething about Stefon and Zoolander whispering to each other as the segment closed _long_ after he’s been processed by Sound.

“That was _great_ , Seth!” Alex whispers excitedly, “you really hit it out of the park there--”

Seth rounds on him. “I could do a foundation for childhood obesity _too,_ y’know!” he hisses, and stomps away to the dressing room.

Alex isn’t affected by this in the slightest. “He’s still going!” he hears him say to a member of the crew, “this is amazing, what a great sign for our ratings...”

_Crash._

Seth slams the door. Ah, blessed silence.

Fuck.

Ooooh, _fuck_.

He puts his head in his hands. “Oh my god,” he mumbles, “why did I just do that? Why am I _actually_ a whole unit of stupidity?”

No wonder Stefon didn’t wanna invite him to the big Halloween Blowout. It doesn’t matter if he had plans or not - Derek Zoolander is a way more appropriate friend for Stefon than _Seth_. Seth’s not a party animal. He’s not as prepared for Stefon’s interests as Zoolander probably is. Judging by tonight, he’s not even smarter than a fifth grader.

Wait, _no_.

“Fuck that,” he mutters, “Zoolander’s a _moron_. I’m way smarter than him! He probably thinks ‘Rudolph Hitler’ is some kind of Third Reich reindeer! _Argh--_ ”

He tears his tie off and throws it at the mirror. It doesn’t make him feel better.

Behind him, Stefon enters without knocking.

Shit.

“Oh, Stefon,” Seth says quickly, fiddling with his collar in an attempt to look halfway-sane. “I was just, uh--”

“Throwing a tantrum?” Stefon guesses.

“No! I am thirty-seven years old, I wasn’t _throwing a tantrum_ ,” says Seth, who was definitely doing exactly that. “Anyway, why are you here? I thought you’d be leaving with _Derek_ already.”

He’s already failed at posing as a Normal Human Being Who Isn’t Jealous. Stefon either doesn’t notice, or completely ignores it. “I just came to say hi,” he says, coy as hell and enjoying Seth’s discomfort as much as he usually does. He flattens his back against the dressing room door. “Zoolander’s getting fussed over by an army of stylists. I had to leave because I gave up huffing hairspray fumes last year… Besides, he’s kind of mainstream. I don’t think I’ll stick with him after the Halloween party.”

“Oh, no?” asks Seth.

He hopes that he doesn’t sound too… well. _Hopeful._

“Nononono _no_ , definitely not,” Stefon says, “I’ve already found a man with a big forehead and a stupid pout to stand by, I’m set for life.”

Aw, man, that’s… That’s uncalled for.

 _“Big forehead?!”_ he glowers.

“Yes’m.”

Seth grits his teeth like he’s chewing on glass. “Right. Tell me more about this forehead fella.”

“Oh, this guy has _everything_ ,” Stefon lists, “he’s an intrepid reporter… He’s got a _hell_ of a mean right hook… He doesn’t so much have a _quiff_ as he does a _big cowlick_ …”

Damn, he’s really not letting up tonight.

“Just out of interest,” Seth asks, “are you gonna bully me for, like, the whole evening? Or are you planning on cutting me some slack for not being on board with Human Fire Extinguishers?”

Stefon stops. He struggles against a grin and loses.

Goddammit, Seth’s being _fucked_ with.

“Tintin,” says Stefon. His shoulders are shaking with the giggles he’s holding back. “…I’m talking about Tintin.”

“Yeah, well, have fun on Tintin’s _Update du Week-end_ ,” Seth gripes, “I bet Zoolander would love to be a guest on there, too.”

The dressing room is kind of a tip after Seth’s earlier outburst, so he avoids incriminating himself further and starts gathering up his stuff. Sans the tie - it’d draw more attention to it if he tidied it away, so he kicks it under the table and wriggles into his coat.

The silence is unnerving. 

Seth turns back around, and tilts his head curiously at the quiet. Not quite a question pause - more of an ‘answer’ pause.

“He called me ‘not sexy’,” Stefon says, after a second of keeping it to himself.

He’s pouting. Oh, Zoolander had _totally_ lost points there - it’s almost bet-worthy how predictable that had been.

Cautious as all hell, Seth eventually tells him: “…I don’t think that’s for him to decide.”

It’s a careful enough response. If he knows Stefon at all, then his friend was definitely fishing for Seth to say _‘I think you’re sexy’_ , which he’d rather not do after everything that went down tonight.

Stefon mulls it over for a moment. “I don’t _feel_ very sexy,” he settles on.

“I’m sure you’ll regain the feeling.”

“Maybe you should help--”

 _“No,”_ Seth grins. “I’m _not_ helping you feel sexier, Stefon.”

“Oh, come on,” Stefon says. “Just look me up and down for a second… Stefon’s like the people who dress as Tinkerbell for Halloween. He needs to be appreciated or he’ll die.”

Seth crosses his arms. “I’m not gonna do it. Your boots would blind me.”

“Check me out, Seth,” says Stefon. “Check me out. _Coward._ ”

He’s doing that pointy thing he does when he wants something and has lost all patience, moving in the way a bird might peck at the earth for worms. Seth shifts his weight from foot to foot, sighs, unfolds and re-folds his arms, sighs again, and then finally makes eye contact with Stefon. He knows how to do this. Come on.

Eyes, lips, hips, bring it _allllll_ the way back to the top.

Stefon preens.

“Better?” Seth asks flatly.

“Much,” says Stefon. He’s positively _glowing_. Seth thinks that might be the end of it, and quickly realizes what a stupid idea that is when Stefon starts towards the dressing table: “are there breakables on here?” he asks, “I need to know before I sweep it all onto the floor, so you can take me right here, right _now--_ ”

This _guy_. Honestly. “Good _night_ , Stefon,” says Seth, louder than necessary, and hates how he can’t stop smiling.

Stefon bites his lip, cupping a bottle of cologne in both hands. “Worth a try,” he smirks. “Have a nice Halloween, Seth Meyers. I’ll be thinking of you.”

“Yeah, have a nice time at OhNoHereWeGo, or whatever.”

“It’s **SoWoHoNoBoHeWo** ,” Stefon says, “ _god_ , you’re such an old person.”

Sometimes it’s like he’s friends with an irate teenager. He’s not gonna say that out loud, though - not after he was caught having a temper tantrum to rival a four-year-old. (At least he doesn’t have to worry about having to rival Derek Freaking Zoolander now, which is a relief.)

Seth shows him the door, and Stefon totally cocks a hip at him as he passes by, and they continue with their streak of not talking about things, except for when they do.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Vomit mention tw.

**Christmas 2011**

December descends on New York with all the usual frenzied holiday drama. The Big Apple’s a city that has _everything_ : bright lights and alcohol; sex scandals; black ice; family matters; the desperate hunt for someone to spend time with.

(That last one is how Flirting Expert Rebecca Larue comes to feature on Weekend Update. Seth is not currently speaking to his writers.)

Immediately after Miss Larue introduces him to her panties in front of a live studio audience, Seth has Stefon on the Holiday’s Hottest Tips to contend with. And though he’s definitely nervous all over again - _c’mon, Stefon,_ he thinks, _you brought on your own damn guest last time you were here_ \- he also opens with a political line that immediately sets off their dynamic.

God, Seth’s never gonna get over how noises can just… Come out of Stefon’s mouth like that. It’s like he can trigger and un-trigger puberty at any given moment.

He doesn’t even know if he can pronounce **BAAAAAAA-BAANAM**. Making Stefon repeat that one by using it in a sentence is only a smidge because Seth likes to make him break down with laughter. In actuality, it’s because Seth just _slightly_ still does not believe him 100% of the time.

When ‘Doctors Without Boners’ comes up, he wonders if Stefon’s starting a trend of getting Seth to support the most outlandish causes possible. It’s not an unreasonable assumption.

And hell, it’s the _holidays_ \- so Seth doesn’t feel at-odds with the decision to hug Stefon at the end. ‘Tis the season, joy and good cheer, yadda yadda yadda. 

“Okay, first things first,” Seth says, as they make a beeline for the elevators, “while I appreciate the gesture, do _not_ commit any kind of hate crime in the pursuit of a Christmas gift for me. Do _not_.”

“Don’t be silly,” Stefon says.

“I’m being deadly serious--”

“I wouldn’t waste a cool present like a Human Boombox on _Seth Meyers_ ,” he explains, “he wouldn’t know what to do with it, he’s a boring senior citizen! I got you a gift for Normal Christmas.”

The elevator doors close on them. Seth holds his messenger bag to his chest like the placard in a mugshot.

“You, uh… You wanna sit out by the tree for a sec?” he asks, and Stefon nods delightedly, as though Seth had organized the entire concept of Christmas just to put forward that question.

This year, the Rockefeller Center Christmas Tree is seventy-four feet tall, seventy- _five_ years old, and was lit up with five miles of energy-efficient LEDs to the tune of ‘Joy to the World’. Watching the workers put the star on top is the highlight of that one, precious November afternoon in the office.

“It’s a shame you have to execute it to bring it here,” Stefon says sadly. “I wish we had one all the time. You could decorate it for different special occasions, all year round.”

Huh. That’s a pretty progressive idea. “I like that a lot, Stefon,” Seth says. “That’s a very sweet sentiment.”

“Dibs on Dungeon Week.”

Ah, there it is.

“I wanna cuff the tree.”

“That doesn’t even make any sense,” Seth replies, snorting, and he leads them over to the rink.

It’s miraculously devoid of crowds - there are still a few people around snapping photos, sure, but it’s nowhere near the levels of daytime footfall. (Although that may have something to with how the rink closes at midnight, and it’s well on the way to two in the morning, now.)

They snag a bench seat under the flag of Burkina Faso. Stefon isn’t shivering. It’s fallen below freezing but he pulls down his sleeves just like he does in the studio - because he’s too aware of himself _not_ to, rather than because of the temperature.

“You don’t have to be anywhere tonight, right?” he asks him.

“Noooo,” says Stefon. “I’m at **Push** for Haunted Bluegrass Tuesday, and the night after that I’m going back to **Ounce** …”

Seth squints. “Is that the one in the middle of the East River?”

“The very same,” Stefon says, adjusting his posture until he’s sat up ramrod-straight. “I’ve been writing on how the party went down at **SoWoHoNoBoHeWo** , and I thought, hey, the classic river party deserves an honorable mention… So no, I only really have to be home to feed my dog in the morning.”

If Seth’s brain could do a record scratch, then now would be an appropriate time.

“Wait a second,” he starts, “when did you get a _dog_?!”

“Around the time that one of the pickpockets at **Mmm- _Hmm_** taught me how to jimmy a lock,” says Stefon, and wiggles his fingers to punctuate it. “What a nice man.”

“Stefon… Did you _steal_ a dog?!”

“Seth Meyerrrrrrs,” he whines, “the neighbors were gone for two days! _Two days_ of scratching at the door with his velvet puppy hands--”

“Paws--”

“--until I wiggled in through one of those windows with the fancy safety mechanisms on,” Stefon continues, “and took him back to my garbage can place. He ate four kosher hot dogs and he puked and I love him.”

Seth pinches the bridge of his nose. “Stefon,” he says slowly. “You can’t just _steal a dog_ from someone.”

“Well, it’s been three and a half weeks and they haven’t noticed,” Stefon retorts. “They went to a Thanksgiving Something right after they got back, and they didn’t care _then_ , either. His name is Bark Ruffalo, he’s _super_ healthy now, and he’s just as silent as he was before. He’s my Hairy Dogbrother.”

Christ. Who the hell is Seth to argue with animal cruelty prevention?

“Guess you get to give those dog-friendly clubs a whirl after all,” he says.

Stefon lights up. “Yesyesyesyes! YES. He’s coming with me to the Ultimate Su-paw-hero Testing Night in the Bronx next month. A whole bunch of dogs in a room full of people on allergy medication trials… It’s gonna be _transcendent_.”

“I don’t doubt that for a second,” Seth says.

Behind Stefon’s head, the glaring scarlet of the NBC News ticker tape continues to scroll through. **190 NATIONS AGREE TO CLIMATE CHANGE GOAL. TRIBE TURNS TO TRADITION TO FIGHT DIABETES. COLORADO WANTS COMMERCIAL SPACEPORT.** There’s a story Seth’s been reading about a Paralympian who was un-paralyzed in a second accident, and now wants to compete in the Olympics. The world’s trying to give them good news; he just has to listen out for it.

Stefon illegally adopting a dog sounds like one of those headlines.

(Perspective is a perplexing thing, it seems.)

“What was that about not knowing I have a family, by the way?” he asks. “You’ve met my mom. You _know_ I have relatives.”

“Yeah,” says Stefon, like it’s obvious, “but just because you have a mom, it doesn’t mean you have a _family_.”

Seth flinches. Oh, jeez, he’s touched on something that maybe he shouldn’t have done - _well, shit!_ , he thinks, _this got super depressing, super fast!_

It’s kinda late to stop now, though.

“Stefon,” he says slowly, “you’ve told me about your mom and dad…”

“And my brother,” Stefon nods.

“Don’t you spend Christmas with them?” he asks. “With Ms Stefon?”

To his gradual horror, Stefon grimaces. “Oh, _no_ ,” he says. “I-- I, um…”

Then he leans in close. Even though there’s no-one around them to listen in.

“Can this stay _strictly_ between you and me, Seth Meyers?”

“Yeah, buddy,” he says, heart sinking, like he’s had one too many energy drinks over a tough all-nighter at the studio. “Sure thing. Not even Nicole, I promise.”

Stefon edges his way in, closely, conspiratorially:

“Ms Stefon isn’t a real thing,” he whispers.

“What?!” says Seth.

“Yes,” Stefon says miserably.

This is _unprecedented._ “Then who’s your mom?” he asks, mouth gaping in shock. “ _Whaaaat?_ Stefon. _Stefon_.”

“You know my brother David--”

“Yeah, I know _of_ him--”

“Our mom’s unmarried name was ‘David’,” Stefon says, the corners of his lips downturning in a funny little twitch. “I, um… I wanted a mom to be named after, too.”

“So you _made_ one,” Seth says dumbly.

He nods in reply. “Stefon likes to tell people that his mother is _very_ busy.”

“But what about David Bowie?” Seth asks. “What was that about?”

“You know how some people are raised by their grandparents, or by TV, or by wolves…”

Right. Seth’s never met anyone who was raised by wolves. Nevertheless, he motions for Stefon to continue. 

“I have, and I’m _not_ kidding around, aaaall of his records in storage,” he explains, counting on his fingers. “CD, vinyl, cassette tape-- _Stereo 8_. A bunch of his interviews on a flash drive. _Labyrinth_. Mrs Zolesky might be married to Mr Zolesky, Seth,” he says seriously, “but _When the Wind Blows… Fill Your Heart_ … The whole album _Earthling_. Songs like that, yesyesyes, they were a better dad to Stefon than _he’s_ ever been. Bowie understands. Mr Zolesky? Not so much.”

Seth lets out a whoosh of chilly, visible air. God, this is a _lot_. 

He thinks hard, fumbling to muster up _something_ to say about the bombshell. Something comforting, maybe. Something profound and inspiring - something philosophical about the idea of a family. The magic words that would fix Stefon’s feelings on his own flesh and blood.

“…Is _Earthling_ your favorite Bowie record?”

“Yes’m.”

“Jesus Christ,” says Seth, leaning back on his elbows, “that explains _so much_.”

“Right? Imagine if I’d been raised by a Normal Father Figure,” Stefon says, in the same tone of disgust he used to say ‘Normal Christmas’ with. “Stefon would be a _banker_ or something. He’d have a _life-expectancy_. How revolting.” 

“Yeah, that’s crazy,” says Seth, who can’t think of a way to argue with that.

What a bizarrely emotional turn of events.

Stefon’s demeanor suddenly shifts, veering more towards mischief than aversion: “however,” he says pointedly, “there’s something to be said about tradition - provided it’s done _right_.”

And he pulls a bottle of unknown liquor from seemingly _nowhere_. 

Seth gapes. It has a little red ribbon tied lopsidedly around the neck. “I have two questions,” he says, his tone measured: “is that for me, and is it going to poison me?” 

“No more than any other vodka,” Stefon grins.

The bottle is pushed into his hands; he turns it over, the glass searing in the December cold. The label looks hand-designed. **DJ•3↑ (Starka Mix)** , it reads. **1997 // 2011**. 

“One of my friends got married this summer,” Stefon beams. “When we were younger - and more adventurous - a whole group of us did this thing that her family did, like, centuries ago, where on the day you’re born, they take their home-distilled stuff, and they bury it in wine barrels with spices and stuff, and they leave it there until the day of your wedding.”

“That would make your friend _fourteen_ years old,” Seth frowns. 

“Oh, no, DJ Threeway isn’t fourteen,” Stefon explains, “that’s just the year she had her reassignment surgery. It was like, Birthday Two? She called it her ‘remix day’.” 

“I bet she did,” Seth murmurs. 

“Anyways, the cops almost busted us, and-- well, to cut a long story short, I am and have always been _extremely_ good with my hands. And I was only eighteen when we sealed the casks, so she promised me an extra bottle when the time came…”

Seth grins. “And everyone at the wedding came out unscathed?” he asks. 

Stefon returns his smile tenfold. “A present with a danger of death is a very exciting one, Seth Meyers,” he says, “but it wouldn’t be very _Normal Christmas_ of me.” 

“That’s very considerate of you, Stefon,” Seth says, rummaging in his bag for what he brought them outside for. It’s nice to be able to one-up Stefon, to be honest, but he tries not to be too smug about it: “I actually have something for you, too. Picked it out all by myself--”

And he noisily plants a parcel in Stefon’s lap.

“Did you really?! Seth Meyers!”

“No, that was a total lie,” he grins. “Nicole helped a _lot_. Blame her if you don’t like it.”

Stefon peels back the paper with a delicate rustle, pinching between forefinger and thumb like he’s turning the pages of a first edition.

“What do you think?” Seth asks tentatively.

Stefon holds his gift aloft - a black wool coat, thick and weighted. While oversized, it’s simple and smart, like if ranking officers wore military-issue ponchos.

“It’s a hug you can _wear_ ,” Stefon says, his eyes wide, his fingers curling into the material.

“Yeah. I guess it is,” says Seth, as gentle as he can. “You want a hand getting it on?”

“Please. I can dress _myself_.”

Seth’s vision flickers to the army green Ed Hardy with the cardinal sleeves. “Well, excuse _me_ for wanting to be a gentleman,” he snarks, not really meaning it. (It’s the principle of the matter.)

“We all want things we can’t have, Seth,” Stefon says idly, “you may have fooled the public into thinking you’re a straight-laced stick in the mud, but I’ve seen you doing drunken Mother’s Day karaoke, and I _know_ your laces are crooked.”

He slips it over his shoulders. Plain black isn’t his usual style, sure, but it drapes over him with all the theatricality of a magician’s flourish, baggy and heavy and, somehow, tailored. Stefon takes a particular interest in the mirrored shine of the gold buttons as he fastens them. 

“Wow,” says Seth. “You look awesome, buddy.”

Stefon doesn’t say anything.

One of the muscles in his chin twitches, and though he makes a _valiant_ attempt at a friendly smile, it’s pretty clear that he’s overwhelmed.

He’s expecting a quip, or a dig, or maybe a strut by the rink that would have the most accomplished models boiling with envy. Instead, Seth finds himself wrapped in a careful, awkward embrace.

He weighs up his options - he could say _Merry Christmas,_ or a more comforting _hey, hey, it’s okay, buddy, I’m glad you like it,_ or maybe a funnier attempt with _I didn’t think it was so bad a gift that you’d say goodbye to me forever_. 

Or he could keep his trap shut and hug Stefon back. 

Which is what he ends up going with. 

After a few breaths, Stefon draws back, blinking a great deal more than he usually does. “Thank you, Seth Meyers,” he says, smiling a huge, watery smile and untangling his hand from the back of Seth’s neck, “happy holidays.”

“Yeah, well, like I said,” Seth shrugs. “Thank Nicole, she’s the mastermind.”

“I will. I’ll write her.”

“Have you got somewhere to be this Christmas?” Seth asks, suddenly struck with the thought of Stefon and his new dog in a silent, sad apartment.

To his relief, Stefon nods: “yesyesyes. Stefon’s at David’s this year. My sister-in-law is looking forward to meeting Bark Ruffalo.”

“Good,” says Seth, and they move to stand at the same time, as though they can both feel the thread of their conversation unspooling with every word. He holds his amber bottle of wedding vodka up in farewell; it catches the light for a half-second, and sparkles the same gold as Prometheus under the LEDs.

Stefon wraps his arms around himself. 

“Merry Christmas, Stefon,” Seth tells him. “I look forward to opening this, I mean it. Thanks for keeping me warm this season.”

“Merry Christmas, Seth Meyers,” replies Stefon. “Thanks for…”

Seth doesn’t interrupt as Stefon trails off, struggling with the wording of his sentiment. (His thoughts are always worth the wait.) He visibly reaches for another sentence, and when he finds it, he adds:

“For never letting me be cold.”

Then it’s _finally_ easy to believe Stefon runs hot all the time. How could he not, when he’s armed with a smile like that? Compared to him, the Rockefeller Tree might as well be a porch light. 


	8. Chapter 8

**February 2012**

February 11th 2012 is a Saturday. Whitney Houston just died, it’s cold as _balls_ and it keeps trying to snow, goddamnit, and Seth has also been working at the desk tonight. 

So by the time he makes it over the Brooklyn Bridge, it’s the roaring hours of the morning, and things are just the _teeniest_ bit busy.

That fits with their schedule just fine, though. It’s ticked over to the 12th, now.

“You look like you’ve had a rough start to the day,” Stefon snarks, leading Seth down the street by the cuff of his coat.

“You know, for normal people, it’s the _end_ of the day. Actually, I work _past_ the end of most people’s days,” he replies. “Hello to you too, by the way. Is my night about to get even rougher?”

“Like the lion dancefloor at that one place in Albany,” says Stefon. “It’s like a sandpaper spa day set to techno music.”

“Oh, god, no,” Seth mumbles. He almost slips on his ass down a flight of steps, and can’t tell if he’s disgusted with himself for grabbing the handrail or not.

“I take it lions weren’t on the schedule for Weekend Update? Booooooring--”

“They were not, no,” he says, “but Nicolas Cage cloned himself and it was _awesome_ , and Poehler’s guest anchoring next week, so you have all that to contend with. Where the hell are we going, Stefon?”

They stop in front of a flat wall of stone. It’s cut into the ground like a subterranean apartment, except there’s no shitty Home Depot doors, or any kind of decoration on the outside, or any windows. Or people outside… Or, really, anything at all.

“This,” Stefon says, throwing his hands stiffly at the door, “is **Cheg**.”

He twists the valve on the door, heaves it open, and gestures for Seth to go first.

It’s a blank corridor, with more steps leading down at least two floors further. When they hit the bottom, Stefon whispers into a wall-mounted mailbox to gain access to the main room - the door to which is pasted with yellow and black caution tape, and makes Seth shiver to look at.

“Password,” Stefon explains, like he’s doing an aside.

Seth shoulders the door open. “Right,” he says, and then he can't think of anything else to say, because the assault on his eyes is vivid and instant.

It’s _hot_ in there, for a start. The people come in all styles and sizes, and the music is a tinny hum of individual notes broadcast over a tannoy system. Metal pipes run across the ceiling in clumps of ten sizes or more. He thinks he sees a bar on the other side of the hall, but when he squints, it looks more like the girl from _The Ring_ is hooked up to a car battery.

He tosses a ‘question pause’ expression Stefon’s way.

“You have to do your bit, Seth Meyers,” Stefon whines. “Y’know, the bit at the beginning. Otherwise I can’t start, it’ll sound wrong.”

Seth eyes a monochromatic young lady, who kinda looks like a twice-widowed Victorian doily. “Okay,” he says slowly.

He clears his throat; Stefon delivers miniscule applause.

“So, Stefon - Saturday night in New York City is a big deal. _Hundreds_ of exhausted late-night news anchors will be stepping out to enjoy their previously-agreed pre-Valentine’s Day traditions - any recommendations for where they and their ex-tweaker friends can have a safe, platonic time?”

Stefon _radiates_ happiness.

“Yes. Yesyesyes. New York’s Hottest Club is **Cheg** \--”

And Seth watches with wonder, surrounded by grayed out lights and regular patrons of chaos, as Stefon launches into an entry from his bespoke nightlife encyclopedia. He’s in his element. They’re on _his_ turf now.

“Located in what we call ‘Brooklyn Depths’, this Brutalist nuclear bunker is the closest anyone’s managed to get to a ‘Blair Witch Project’ Snapchat filter,” he states. “This place has everything: concrete walls, erotic electrocution, Goth kids - but like, the _lacy_ kind - and a balcony where some guy who hasn’t showered or shaved for four days comes out and plays Spanish guitar!”

With a skyward gesture, Seth follows Stefon’s pointing and notices a wholeass mezzanine jutting out of the ceiling. Oh, yeah. That’s certainly a stubbly guy who hasn’t gone outside for a little while up there, and it sounds like he’s playing flamenco music. Well, that explains the tannoy track.

“All this, and Human Capri Suns.”

Seth glances back at floor-level, to see Stefon spreading his arms proudly, as if he’d summoned **Cheg** from some forgotten circle of hell himself.

“What’s a Human Capri Sun?” Seth asks.

There’s no time to feel regret. With direction from his club guide, his attention is pointed towards a group of people in full-body plastic costumes. They look _heavy_. Like the blobs of motion that float in lava lamps. 

“It’s this new thing, right, where-- you know those blow-up sumo wrestling suits?”

“...I’m aware of them.”

“Well, you get someone to wear one,” Stefon giggles, “and _then_ you fill it with orange juice and stab it with a plastic tube--”

“And that’s supposed to be fun for all involved parties, is it?” Seth asks, watching him fight off the hysterics.

The operation is a total failure. “Yep,” says Stefon, and dabs at his eyes. “‘Cos, like, when you’re done, you can-- you can blow air into them, to make them look like they’re full again--”

“Okay, yeah, I get the idea. Thank you, Stefon.”

“You’re welcome,” he cries. 

Seth claps his hands together. (One of the Goth boys startles, and snags his outfit on the crocodile clips attached to the guy next to him.) “So do you wanna get a drink?” he asks. “Does this place do drinks? I can never tell with your suggestions, and to be honest, I’m _way_ too sober right now.”

“Oh, honey, we can fix that,” Stefon says.

His knuckles rap loudly against an aluminum panel on the wall behind them, and Seth jumps a million miles when it flips down to reveal a hatch. (The Goth boy with the snagged sleeves does not.)

“Candy Crush doubles, please,” Stefon says.

A little tray slides out - two plastic tumblers of soda, it looks like, as well as some Sweethearts on a saucer.

“That’s a bad idea,” Seth says immediately.

“It’s not E,” Stefon retorts, just as fast, “it’s powdered alcohol. You _said_ you were too sober… But we can get some E if you want--”

“No no no, it’s cool,” he rushes, “like, I trust you not to let me die, I’d just rather not do drugs this far from my apartment.”

Stefon plucks his soda tumbler and candy heart from the tray. “Then it’s a good day to be you,” he says. “This is like, five shots in one, so you’ll catch up in no time. Then it’ll just be a matter of getting your _drunk_ ass home when you’re this far from your apartment.”

“Hm. Been _there_ before.”

Stefon smirks, delicately holding his tumbler by the rim, and watches eagle-eyed as Seth retrieves his drink.

“ _Prost_ ,” he says, clacking their cups together.

“Wait!”

Stefon’s already thrown back his powder. “What?”

“They’re candy hearts,” Seth says exasperatedly, “you can’t just _eat_ them without looking at what they say!”

It’s not too late, apparently; Stefon sticks his tongue out, with the heart resting square in the middle. In searing pink, it reads _‘BLOW ME’_.

Seth glances down at the heart in his hand, which says _‘SORRY’_.

“You know what? _Prost_ back atcha,” he says, and they down their Sprite together. Reading the messages on Sweethearts is overrated, anyway.

Within minutes, the room is considerably more wiggly, and the weight of the night lifts from his shoulders like it’s made of helium. The shower-and-shave-free guy has launched into a soulful, plucked rendition of ‘How Will I Know’ above them.

“I like this place,” Seth decides. “It’s not blowing out my eardrums, I can actually hold a conversation with you without stripping my throat raw.”

Stefon says something under his breath that sounds suspiciously like _we’ll fix that_. “I picked **Cheg** for a reason,” he says, “and that reason was _not_ your dancing skills.”

“I’m hoping that means it’s my charisma and charm…?”

Stefon side-eyes him.

“…Sure. We can go with that.”

“Then let’s try something new,” Seth says, taking a leap of faith into uncharted territory. “I’m gonna do my interview-type talk thing from the desk, but we can’t discuss anything we usually work on during the segment. No crossover, okay?”

“Yes’m,” says Stefon.

There’s a buzzing and a shriek from their left, as a club patron zaps another with their assigned car battery. He’s gonna have to pull out all the stops to get Stefon to not talk about nightlife.

Then it hits him.

“Tell me three things you like doing,” Seth says - he holds up a finger, _pause for effect_ \- “that _aren’t_ club-related.”

Stefon smears lip gloss with his finger as he weighs up his top rankings. “Number one,” he says: “telling the cult recruiters that hang outside subway stations that I practice lesbian necromancy.”

“Oooh, that’s a good one,” Seth nods.

“Number two: going into independent coffee shops, buying a _still_ water - not sparkling - and talking to whoever’s with me about how ‘our ratings are _way_ down. We need someone with vision, someone with a Midas Touch for media.. We need a _miracle_ , goddamnit!’”

“That,” Seth says, factual as anything, “is _fucking_ hilarious.”

“It’s a wonderful way to end a morning,” Stefon says dreamily. 

(Of course Stefon’s mornings end at, like, ten AM… Seth’s not sure what he’d expected.)

“What’s number three?”

“Oh, my bodega sandwich navigation classes,” Stefon replies. “They’re not nearly as _entertaining_ , but they’re pretty interesting. Plus I heard that there’s no wrong time to start learning a new language, so…”

“You know what?” he grins. Stefon lowers his lashes in anticipation. “That _is_ kind of a whole language. Are you telling me you don’t just have one bodega you’ve fucked up your order in a lot?”

“Not everything in life has to be trial and error, Seth Meyers. A lot of the time, you just have to figure out the answers to a question that nobody’s asked yet.”

“You’re not wrong,” says Seth, who can’t figure out how to tell Stefon how much he enjoys his profound moments, not without the other man getting either self-conscious or ego-inflated. Sometimes Stefon comes out with the prettiest, deepest sentiments, and Seth never gets to see that in their segments together. He thinks it’s sweet.

Then again, he might just be drunk right now.

Around them, grown adults in historical formalwear dance intricate routines, their eyes blown the same colors as their clothes, that Seth can only describe as belonging to the genre ‘flamenco night terror’. The two of them pass on the car battery (“I’ll be sure to wear my ‘shock shirt’ next time,” Stefon says), and they order another round of the bizarre Crush drinks. Which Seth imagines will probably be his last round, and Stefon’s halfway point, judging by the way he’s smoothing down his hair at the message _‘YOU SHINE’_.

Seth’s says _‘8 INCHES’._ (He puts it out of his mind and into his mouth. Goddamnit.)

“We’ve got a gap coming up a month from now,” he says casually, crunching down - they’re like traditional conversation hearts, chalky and powdery. 

“You do?”

“Yeah,” he says, “Rebecca Larue dropped out, said something about a Speed Dating training session she’s running... Anyway, I’d rather have you there, so I thought I’d see if you were free. You can say no.”

“But I won’t,” Stefon smirks, and that’s the end of that.

(Seth vaguely remembers to set a reminder to add Stefon to the schedule, before the second candy heart smacks into him full force.)

It’s gone four in the morning by the time they stumble back up the steps, danced out and boiling hot and laughing their asses off at Seth’s recollection of Nicole’s most recent exposé - _‘a trip of wonder to the Cock Ring Warehouse’_ , she’d called it, seething about her editor over FaceTime.

“You should set up a club and name it that,” Seth had told him. (Stefon had almost spit OJ out everywhere.)

Now, though, he’s cackling to himself about Seth’s drunken moron antics:

“I can’t believe you yelled at the guitar guy!”

“He was playing ‘My Heart Will Go On’!” Seth protests. “That’s fucking Céline Dion and you _know_ it. Not tonight, Stefon. Not on her night.”

Stefon purses his lips and pulls down his sleeves, in what’s probably a form of agreement.

They stop at the top of the steps. He can barely feel the cold; alcohol is a hell of a central heating system. He’s even holding onto the end of the handrail, for god’s sake, he doesn’t even _care_ right now.

“Time to wrap this up?”

“It’s your line,” Stefon reminds him.

“Oh, right,” he says, and _ahems_ himself into propriety. “Stefon… I asked you - and you agreed - to show me a hotspot for two friends to catch up with each other, on an unofficial Valentine’s trip. _Instead_ , you took me to a mandy-fueled, circus-like slum that thrives on erogenous fear--”

Stefon nods seriously. “I can’t fault that description, no.”

“But you know what?” Seth continues. “I had _fun_ tonight!” 

“And we didn’t even do E!”

“Maybe next time,” says Seth, because he’s drunk as hell, and because Stefon is really very nice company when he’s overwhelmed with happiness.

“I love you!” Stefon flirts, jabbing his index finger in Seth’s direction. “Say it back, Seth Meyers, say it back--”

“No, I’m not saying it back,” he snorts, but Stefon isn’t giving up anytime soon.

“Come on, Seth, say it. _Say it._ I love you, Seth Meyerrrrrs--”

“Yeah, love you too,” Seth says, relenting. Stefon cheers. “Get outta here, go on…”

Stefon sticks his tongue out, and starts walking backwards in the direction of his subway stop. Seth’s kind of bummed out that the night’s coming to a close.

“This is a mutual love, Seth Meyers! At the most wonderful time of the yeeeeear--!”

“Stop singing, you’re the worst.”

He gets a peace sign and the bird in quick succession. “Get home safe, you legless old bore,” he laughs.

“And you,” he says, struggling, “you-- you _tart_.”

Stefon gasps.

“Yeah, you heard me!” Seth snickers. “See you in a couple weeks, buddy. Get home safe!”

(And he was _so_ right, by the way. Getting home while drunk is a _lot_ easier than floating around the F train off his face.)


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Good morning! Guess who's a prize halfwit and forgot half the chapter in the last upload? A second update will be scheduled today as usual.

**March 2012**

It’s not until Stefon’s next slot that Seth fully grasps his cultural exposure, here.

Like, yeah, he’s constantly talking about his relatively-normal life when he sees the guy. Showing him Normal Christmas. Taking him to the standard tourist spots, where people very rarely get maimed for others’ entertainment.

He can say things like:

“You hear Snooki’s having a kid?”

And Stefon will make a knowing face, and lean in close so the stage crew can’t hear him, and say:

“Do you need consoling, Seth Meyers?”

“You know, I think maybe I do,” Seth says, with a theatrical sigh, “I really thought she was the one, man… I’m crushed, let me tell you.”

“There’ll be other women with the figure of a dollar symbol,” says Stefon, patting his arm half-heartedly. “Or not… Maybe there’ll be this _guy,_ with the figure of the man on a restroom sign, that you can--”

“Aw, no, come on, that’s not accurate at all,” says Seth. He gives him a once-over: “I think he looks more like a letter-opener.”

“Are you saying my figure could kill in the right hands?”

“It’s supposed to be the ‘wrong’ hands,” Seth grins, but he doesn’t say ‘no’. 

That’s how it is.

But then the segment starts, and Seth starts to think that there’s a lot of stuff about his own brain that he hasn’t _actually_ taken notice of yet.

For example, it’s clear that he understands Stefon’s struggle with keeping the calendar straight. He’s usually confused about the weather; he doesn’t quite get what March Madness is, and he’s probably only heard about Saint Patrick in reference to a bawdy reenactment with an emphasis on staffs and snakes. Asking him for an event night recommendation is both useless and priceless.

But Seth, before Stefon, would have started with questions about ‘Heprechauns’ such as, ‘why is that an attraction at a New York hotspot?’, or, ‘who exactly wants to go and see them?’, or even, ‘leprechauns are _real?’._

But nope - he starts with the big question that Stefon’s gonna mesh with the best. Which is:

“How did they get Hep C?”

And when even _Stefon_ says, “I’m not gonna ask,” then he knows he’s hit a vein of excellent club information.

So Seth’s asking the questions that Stefon might think to ask, now, like he’s actually starting to integrate with the scene, and it’s a little scary? Ish? The comfort comes in the personal touch, rather than the professional one. _Thank_ you, Human Roombas - it always makes Stefon _totally_ lose it when he has to explain something that was previously obvious to him, like he’s just realizing for the first time how ridiculous it is. Seth _loves_ doing that to him, and the audience thrive off the energy. It’s not every day you get to see a club kid crack the hell up on live television.

But of course, Stefon has his revenge with the kiss.

Ooooooooooh, boy.

His first thought is, _I shouldn’t have read that button out loud,_ which is rapidly followed by, _Nicole is going to find this fucking hilarious, and I hate her for it already._

The third thought is that Stefon is undoing the nice drag of his thumb across Seth’s cheekbone by _slapping him multiple times in the face_.

The fourth is after it’s all finished. It mostly consists of: _Stefon is visibly squeezing my leg under the desk._

They’re met with a similar level of uproar and glee backstage - except in Seth’s line of work, it’s as big a deal as it would be to their audience, in-house or otherwise, because the majority of them are fairly left-wing. In fact, anyone right-wing is usually pretty open-minded when it comes to current affairs. Stefon’s never had to worry about a weird reaction from his co-workers, and Seth’s always had people watching his back when he talks about potentially turbulent headlines.

(The American people are not always forgiving.)

It does bug him a little, however, that everyone thinks it’s the funniest wisecrack ever broadcast to the nation.

It’s not funny purely because it’s _gay_. It works because Stefon has a track record of seizing opportunities when they’re presented to him, and he set this one up himself, and it worked in his favor. It’s funny because the way that they can happily, comfortably continue to close the segment afterwards shows how close they are. It’s funny because it wouldn’t have stopped if Seth hadn’t turned his head away.

It’s funny because they didn’t mention it afterwards. 

And now someone from wardrobe is giving him a thumbs up and killing the fucking joke off.

Luckily, Stefon’s a genius. With presumably the same sense he uses to pause for questions, he hovers his hand over the small of Seth’s back - never touching - and waves him through the blockade of people. “Excuse me,” he calls, “ _excuse_ me, recruitment for the Agenda in progress, I have a man to ravish here--”

“Oh, my god,” Seth cringes, and plays along with a smile that’s more of a wince.

“Come on, Mr O’Meyers, let’s get you a Guinness! It’ll be fun--”

And they duck through the excited crew, until finally they’re in the safety of Seth’s dressing room, and that’s almost worse.

He takes in a steadying breath. 

“Sorry,” Stefon says. “I didn’t know they’d react like that. To you, I mean, I kind of expected it for me.”

“Well, you shouldn’t,” Seth says, because the idea of Stefon being used to people laughing _at_ him, not _with_ him, makes him feel slightly nauseous. “Like, yeah, you didn’t think about _me_ as a part of that equation, but it’s fine.”

Stefon adjusts his fringe, fidgety and twitching at the mouth.

“It’s _fine_ ,” Seth repeats. “I’d tell you if you overstepped, you know I would. Hell, I just did a kissy face back at you! We’re still cool.”

“Okay,” says Stefon.

“Yeah. You’re _okay_.”

“...Are you mad?”

“Not at you!” Seth says, which is true. “I’m mad at everyone else for taking the bit wrong. Sure, it was a surprise, and it was unconventional, but it’s not like you’re the first guest ever to make a move on the Weekend Update anchor. I guess everyone watching drew laughs from _those_ experiences, instead of applying it to _us_.”

“Mm-hmm,” Stefon hums. He agrees it in a way that sounds like he’s saying _‘I’m never going to bring this up again… but in a way that means I’m gonna bring it up occasionally, and at the worst possible moments, too! So get ready for that to happen’. _

Seth huffs. “Oh, boy… This St. Patrick’s Day is gonna be a messy one.”

What he doesn’t say is that he’s also mad at _himself_.

Because Seth kissed back.

Just a little. The tiniest amount of pressure. But he knows, even on the off-chance his traitorous mouth _hadn’t_ been noticed on-camera, that Stefon felt it.

Stefon’s picking at the threads of his sleeves and sneaking looks at him, but he’s trying to make it look like he isn’t. 

“Don’t,” Seth warns.

“I’m _not_.”

“Good.”

“ _Fine_.”

Oh, it’s almost worse that they _didn’t_ fight. It’s like looking at the underwear pages in a Sears catalogue - childish, stupid, hinting at _something_ without offering anything substantial in the first place.

 _Fuck._ Seth kissed back; he doesn’t want to talk about it.

“It’s not good for your face to tense it like that--”

“There’s not a ‘like that’. Like _what?_ Shut up,” he says quickly, “my face is fine.”

“Oh, I _know_ ,” Stefon murmurs to himself. He does that _thing,_ where his eyes trace a line all the way down Seth’s face, and his body stays as still as possible, like his attraction might fizz up and bubble over if he swishes around too much. “Just let your smile _free_ , Seth Meyers! What’s the worst that could happen?”

“Oh, I don’t know… One of my best friends in the world could plant one on me on live television, provoking the multiphobic masses and opening himself up to a whole world of backlash. That’s all.”

“That’s all?” he asks hopefully.

Before he packs his things into his messenger bag, Seth removes the button from his lapel, and props it up by the mirror, next to all the other permanent fixtures he’s installed there. Stefon doesn’t say a word, but when Seth leans into his personal space, heading past him on the way out, his smirk is unyielding.

A returning smile accidentally slips onto Seth’s face.

“That’s _all_ ,” he grins, and hates that it doesn’t sound true, hates that he doesn’t particularly care if there’s gravity behind his statements or not. Seth’s got a little Irish blood in him, goddamnit - he kissed back, he doesn’t want to talk about it, and he kind of _enjoyed_ it.

(Nicole sends him a photo from her office on Monday - she’s changed her desktop background to a grainy screenshot of the moment. Stefon’s eyes are half-open. She seems to have tactically displayed an actual framed photograph, where she and Seth are kissing on a past trip to the Grand Canyon, _right_ next to the monitor.

Seth sends her back a kissy-face selfie. His middle finger is extremely prominent in the shot.)

**May 2012**

Stefon drops off the radar for six weeks or so. Nicole gets a finger-painted postcard during this time, on the back of which is scrawled _I took three tabs of acid and became an impressionist tonight, not sure I can go back. I hope you understand. Love, Stefon._

Seth, on the other hand, gets a single Polaroid in the mail. On the back is nothing more than postage and his address, printed in gold Sharpie and all caps. On the _front_ is an overexposed shot of Stefon posing with two little people, all of them with glittery faces and big smiles. A neon sign in the background is twisted into the shape of a diving eagle.

So no, Seth hasn’t really spoken to him directly for a while, which is why it’s so exciting when his writer Alex gives him a pointed elbow to the ribs and gestures at the schedule.

“The season finale?”

“Yeah,” he smirks, “so stop sighing like a furnace every time the word ‘parties’ gets brought up. We’ll send you out with style.”

“Oh, god,” says Seth, grinning ear to ear, and not really meaning it.

(It’s all very convenient. The Admiral General they had on a couple of weeks back threatened Seth’s family and stole his dad’s cell phone. It’s possible that Alex feels kinda bad about the whole thing, which would explain why he’s making the finale sound so appealing. Seth _loves_ it - he finally persuaded his father to upgrade to a smartphone _and_ he keeps finding fruit baskets in his dressing room.)

He even gets into work early that Saturday, thinking he can either catch Stefon before things get crazy or use the time to prepare ahead of schedule. He’s gotta get an update on that mute dog, man, it’s been too long! Just thinking on the info he might get makes him speed-walk out of the elevator.

Except when he turns into the studio, Stefon is talking to Drunk Uncle.

“When I was a kid,” he’s slurring, “you couldn’t go to a club unless you had pearls-ascot-parasol-coattails-bootstraps!”

“Oh, no, some of us _do_ still dress up like that,” Stefon says airily.

Seth approaches them, firm yet apprehensive. “Hey, Stefon.”

“Hiiiii,” Stefon drawls.

“N’aw, hey, Norm,” says Drunk Uncle.

“Norm got fired fifteen years ago,” Seth deadpans. “Drunk Uncle, what are you _doing_ here? You’re not scheduled in again for the rest of the season.”

“I’m just stoppin’ byyyy,” he says, holding up an enormous bottle of scotch. “Just… Left some things here. My sister’s kid works here, _hello_ …”

Stefon clicks his heels together. “Did you know this nice gentleman is a registered Republican? He’s _very_ proud of it.”

“Yes, I knew,” says Seth, “Drunk Uncle, you gotta leave, we’re starting pre-show in, like, a couple hours.”

The instruction lands about as well as expected - like the Hindenburg.

“Ssso I’m not an _Avengers_ , okay? So I don’t know how to succeed in business without really trying, _okay?_ So maybe I’m not a Larchh Hadron Collider. Okay?!” Drunk Uncle swirls his glass dangerously, eyes the size of dinner plates: _“whoomwhoom-whoom-whoom whoooooom!”_

Stefon shakes his head sadly.

“That’s just not him, Seth…”

“That’s _not_ me.”

“That’s not anyone!” Seth blurts out. He whips out his cell phone: “I’m calling security to escort Drunk Uncle to a cab. _Before_ he says something bad and provokes the cast, _again_. I don’t wanna see Nasim do her scary-calm threatening routine.”

Stefon raises a hand. “I do.”

“Same _Seth_ Marriage!” Drunk Uncle interjects, and jabs his scotch at Stefon. “This guy knows what I’m sayin’.”

“No, he doesn’t,” says Seth, “ _no-one_ knows what you’re saying.”

Drunk Uncle isn’t fazed. He continues on as though Seth hadn’t said anything. “A good, all-American, god-fearing guy,” he says, and claps Stefon on the shoulder, twisting his arm at an odd angle to reach.

Stefon’s smile is devilish.

“Oh, honey,” he says, breathily as ever, “literally _none_ of what you said is true. I’m a morally-gray child of Jewish Poles! Who’s _occasionally_ a woman.”

As entertaining as it may be, to see nausea settle like a blanket of snow over Drunk Uncle’s blotchy features, this is also new information for Seth. His eyebrows shoot up without permission. “A woman?” he asks.

“Sometimes a cube-person, too,” Stefon says flippantly, “it depends on what kind of molly episode I’m having.”

Drunk Uncle looks like he’s about to interrupt with shitfaced horror, but before anyone can say ‘it’s five o’clock somewhere’, security personnel flank his sides.

“We’ve called a taxi for you, sir,” the first says, kindly strongarming him out of the studio. Drunk Uncle starts to babble about social media. “Break a leg tonight, Mr Meyers…”

“Mr Zolesky, always a pleasure,” says the other, over the fading cries of _‘Google Plus me! Google Plus me!’._ Huh. It shouldn’t be a surprise that 30 Rock’s front desk know Stefon by name, and yet somehow it is.

Stefon quietly waves buh-bye; they watch security stuff their uninvited guest into the elevator, and when the doors close, he lets his hand fall.

“ _Aw_. What a nice man.”

‘Speechless’ is a very versatile word, Seth thinks, as he stares at Stefon incredulously.

“I hope he liked my gift ideas for his niece’s wife…”

“I don’t think he likes his niece’s wife _or_ his niece,” Seth replies. “Come on, buddy, let’s head in. Nicole and me have been dying to hear about your Spring Break.”

Stefon immediately brightens. “You got my snap!”

“Yeah,” Seth snorts, pushing into his dressing room and holding the door open with his foot. “I have no _idea_ what was going on in it, though.”

Stefon glides inside. “I was checking out a new hotspot.”

“Was this before or after the acid painting?”

“I have _no_ idea,” he grins. “But I’m taking you with me when I next go. Not tonight, I’m at this sea lion place my friend Joel co-owns, I’ll tell you about it later--”

“Wait,” says Seth, “are you planning on taking me to the acid one, or to the Polaroid one?”

“Oh, the one I took the picture in. It’s called--” Stefon clears his throat, placing his hands at a horizontal jut by each ear: “ **Fwsshh… Ca-CAHH!!** And it was _life-changing_.”

“Mmm, yeah,” says Seth, doing his best not to laugh, just in case Stefon thinks he’s poking fun at him. “I could tell that from their neon eagle sign, now that you mention it. Do I have to paint my face all shiny like you did?”

“It’s… optional.”

“Uh oh,” says Seth. “Then I’m opting _not_ to.”

Stefon pulls a face. _Spoilsport._

Unfortunately, Seth’s curiosity gets the better of him. “What is it?”

“It’s this _thing_ ,” Stefon starts, pulling his elbows in, “called a ‘Shine and Rise’? And it’s where you go bobbing for Viagra in a tub of edible glitter--”

“ _Oh-_ kay!” Seth says, finally cracking up. “And you sent me a snap of the aftermath of that?!”

“Well, _technically_ ,” Stefon says seriously. He spreads his hands for emphasis: “though it was more in the aftermath of the glory hole I participated in afterwards--”

“Holy crap, okay,” he wheezes. “No more photos from ten minutes after you’ve been on your knees, please.”

Stefon lowers his eyelashes. With a single raised eyebrow, he asks:

“What makes you think I wasn’t standing?”

(And after that, Seth changes the subject to Nicole’s postcard art. It doesn’t feel wise to dwell on that new info for too long.)

The segment that night goes really well. There’s just something about how they bounce off each other that they’ve honed to chaotic perfection over the last two years. It doesn’t feel _natural_ , per se, but it does feel _easy_ \- whatever they have, it’s synthetic and simple, like slipping into a morphine coma. Seth calls him ‘my man’, and Stefon calls him ‘honey’, and that’s how it sits.

And hell - it’s the season finale. It’s _summer_. He’s coming out of the last episode of the season, in the job he loves, thinking about how badly he wants to see Stefon’s prom pictures with Jacked Beth and how he’s gonna organize _something_ to do with him over the break, even if it’s not on the Fourth of July.

Plus Nicole’s always thought their on-screen thing is funny and cute and cool. Filled with affection, it’s easy for Seth to brush off Stefon’s innuendos with fondness, and say goodnight, and kiss him on the cheek and have his handshake all at once.

“We’ll figure something out,” he murmurs backstage, because the convertible really _is_ a two-seater and Nicole would likely castrate him if she didn’t get to ride in it. “For the Fourth, I mean. It’s better with friends. We could do a Valentine’s style thing if you wanted, go out a few days before?”

Against the rush over everyone else, scrambling madly to conclude the show, Stefon is beautifully still.

“I’d like that,” he breathes.

“Cool,” says Seth. “I’ll see you in the lobby.”

He’s been steadily clearing out his dressing room over the last few weeks, so he snatches up the remainder of the things which won’t survive a three month absence - his cologne, his charger, that one shirt he forgot he left here, plus his stack of script revisions (to be completed). All tied up.

He has to bust through the door one last time.

Almost forgot - the button stuck to his mirror.

“Guess you’re gonna live at home now, little guy,” he says, jamming the ‘Kiss Me I’m Irish’ pin into his messenger bag, before realizing that he’s wasting an awful lot of time talking to a _badge_.

The lobby is totally freaking _packed_. It takes him a good minute or so to fight his way over to the crowd he’s not leaving with tonight, with the aim of saying goodbye to as many people as possible who he won’t cross paths with again until September.

“Is it real?!”

“Oh, honey, it’s real, alright--”

“Hey, Stefon, great piece tonight! I’ll see you at **Scampi** , yeah?”

“They’ll be expecting you! Bye, Brigitte, bye, Taneesha, bye _Zach_ \-- Oh, Colin! I almost scanned over your timeless visage, come here.”

Seth follows the sound of Stefon’s chattering until he stumbles into a clearer view. Right by the exit - he’s got a big night ahead of him, of _course_ , he’s probably been trying to escape for ages - he’s bidding goodnight to all the staff and cast he’s familiar with.

Which is everyone. Stefon has an internal wiki entry on everyone in the building - that’s what makes him good at what he does. And there he is, kissing his friends on the cheek and giving his acquaintances that strange handshake of his, like a grandmother accepting help down a flight of stairs, and then his eyes scan over to land on Seth, and he stops. Sarah’s hand is still mid-shake. (He seems to have forgotten.)

“July,” Seth says simply.

He visibly relaxes. (Sarah seizes her chance to retreat.)

“ _Yes_.”

And that’s all there is to it. Stefon doesn’t seem to know what to do for a second, but eventually settles on reaching forwards and squeezing his forearm, with an uncharacteristically steady hand.

“Goodnight, Seth,” he murmurs.

“Yeah,” Seth says, taken aback, “see ya, buddy,” and just like that, Stefon’s made his way to the door and is exiting the studio.

Leaving Seth gazing after him, wondering what on earth just happened. Someone at his side is calling his name, trying to get his attention, but it takes a few attempts to break through the fog of distraction.

It’s an oddly calm way to round off a very frantic season.


	10. Chapter 10

**Summer 2012**

Amy Poehler comes to the city in the middle of June, which Seth describes as ‘amazing’, ‘fantastic’, and ‘I can’t wait to see you’, and which Amy describes as ‘oh, God, the heat is baking the smell into my clothes and I think that rat-man in the alleyway was eating broken glass’.

“Listen, if you want to hear me complain about New York, you’ve come at the wrong time of year,” Seth points out. “I’m constantly in and out of the place. I miss it when I’m gone.”

Amy sullenly agrees. “You _do_ pine for it,” she says. “Like a homing pigeon got spliced with a labrador.”

She slaps at a scaffolding rod as they duck underneath, as though she’s about to throw a tantrum because he’s correct, but she immediately draws back and looks like she regrets the whole action. _Ew, touching stuff in public!_

“Oh my god, I’ve missed you,” Seth says seriously.

They’ve been wandering through Manhattan at their leisure - sometimes it’s nice to duck into a place that takes your fancy at the time, so they’ve basically been meandering up and down blocks, chatting to each other and looking for bars that aren’t crammed full to bursting. Right now they’ve turned onto East 18th, where the footfall is less dense, and where there’s a florist that Seth just knows Amy’s gonna pester him about later. (He doesn’t mind.)

“How was the Ren Faire?”

“I don’t wanna talk about it.”

At the prospect of some good gossip, she lights up like the Rockefeller Tree. Ah, Poehler and schadenfreude go together like fine wine and cheese.

“That bad, huh?”

“Know who the musical guests were?” Seth asks. _“Garth and Kat._ ‘Bad’ covers it about as much as underwear covers an American Apparel model.”

She winces. “Ouch.”

“Yeah, _ouch_. Nicole kept asking if she could play Garth’s fiddle instead of him, though, so that was pretty funny. But _then_ he started ‘freestyling’ and that was… less funny. You’ve never _seen_ so many angry peasants.”

“Freestyling?”

“Ren Faire hip-hop isn’t all that, let me tell you.”

Amy snort-giggles at the mere thought, shoulder-bumping him as they walk past yet another packed bar. Who the hell is drinking at 3PM on a Friday in June? There’s a shitload of people around, and Seth can’t figure out _why_.

He gets his answer roughly ten seconds later, as everything steadily goes to crap when they step onto Broadway.

Groups of colorful individuals clustered outside the Petco, sipping coffee over ice outside Pret and waiting on their loudly pastel friends to cross the street. Androgynous children lounge by the Andy Monument, snapping pictures of each other.

“Oh,” Seth blinks.

“Well, fuck me,” Amy says succinctly, putting her hands on her hips like some kind of modern-day buckaroo, “it’s Pride season! That explains _so_ much.”

“Did you not get that from all the rainbows we passed?!” he asks. Jeez, there’s so many people here. “This _can’t_ be the official one. That’s not ‘til next week…”

Seth suddenly feels like he’s about to be sick.

Which is stupid. He actively tries not to be homophobic, and it’s not like this is a new situation for him to be in. Public gaiety is, understandably, fairly frequent in New York City. He’s seen it all - drag kings, transgender women in all their bright, beautiful uniforms, butch lesbians who give great hugs - even NYC Pride in full swing a few times.

It’s not new. So why does he feel like shit?

With a further stab of horror, he figures it out: it’s not exactly feeling ‘sick’.

It’s like… green.

Like _jealousy_.

In college, he once brought a girl back to his dorm who turned out to be transgender, and he is _not_ proud of himself for how he handled that situation. (God, that was more than twenty years ago now.) And while he’s worked through a lot of the external phobia-bullshit there, he’s still kind of apprehensive _internally_. Would he have spent the night with her if he hadn’t been clouded with prejudices? Would he have shared the experience with his fraternity, instead of never bringing her up ever again?

How can he be compensating when he really _does_ enjoy rooting for all of those sports teams?

But Seth doesn’t want to think about his impending identity upheaval right now. So he does what he does best: squash it back down again, kid himself that he’ll deal with it later, and throw attention away from his internal freak-out with some ill-timed humor.

“Y’know,” he says slowly. “This might be the one place in the world where people won’t think we’re together.”

Poehler tuts. “Shame. I bring up your social standing just by _being_ here.”

“Your commentary wasn’t requested,” Seth grouses, and they cross the street, stepping over yellow and red pothole markings and dodging the unofficial gathering of New York’s Proudest.

Amy knocks him in the ribs, pointing past Union Square Park in search of bars: “oh,” she grins, “that reminds me! Heard anything new from Stefon lately?”

“I’m not even gonna _ask_ how you got there from here--”

“Huh. I thought it would be obvious.”

“--but yeah,” Seth scowls, “he’s busy for the whole week, he said, so no Fourth of July mania for us. Said something about devising evil, evil plans for that month.”

“Shame,” Amy says again, shaking her head. “Y’know, I still can’t wait to meet him someday. He sounds fun.”

“He’s kinda… intense,” Seth admits. “But my mom survived, so maybe it’s in the cards. You never know.”

“That’s ‘cos your mom is _hardcore_ ,” says Amy, pulling finger-guns at a young man with a chalk-colored mohawk, and they wind their way past the festivities. Around them, life goes on; coffee, commonality, community.

Seth feels better just for having Amy there with him, to be honest. Less self-conscious. Less anxious. Less like he’s somehow stumbled into a restricted zone, or lost his mom in the store, and more like he’s got someone to hold his hand as he passes through.

He thinks he might not protest if she asks for flowers after all. 

“Come on,” he says, with renewed interest in getting drunk. “I know a _great_ place on East 15th.”

**July 2012**

“You _said_ you were ready--”

“I say a lot of things, Nicole!”

“Yeah, _yeah_ , you come out with a farmyard’s worth of bullshit, I’m fully aware of that,” she bites, “but _you said you were ready_.”

Seth crams another shirt into his duffel bag. “It’s your fault,” he says steadily, “for believing me when I answered.”

“It’s _my_ fault?!” Nicole explodes. (Seth suddenly realizes how Not Funny she’d find that remark.) “I’m ten seconds away from shoving these car keys up your _ass_ , you--”

Packing for a vacation is always stress-free, unless you happen to be vacationing with someone who gives a shit about every detail. Nicole is one of those people. Which, to be fair, is due to a series of reports she drew up on common airport misadventures, and also the fact that she likes everything to be in order all the time. It’s _mostly_ reasonable.

Unfortunately for her, Seth works in the late night television industry. They’re _all_ procrastinators. Half the reason why all those shows are daily, weekly, or live is so there’s minimal chances of fucking around with short deadlines.

“Put your shit in the trunk before I put _you_ in the trunk,” she threatens, grinning despite herself.

Seth pops it. “Yeesh, we’re only going for three days! What are you _taking?”_ he asks incredulously. There’s like, a whole suitcase and cool-bag in here.

“Patience,” she retorts. Seth closes the trunk, and through the rear window, he can see Nicole’s snagged the driver’s seat.

“You’re driving now, are you?”

She tosses his shades across the dashboard, already wearing her own pair: “I’m not watching you stall at every intersection on the way out of NYC because you’re too man to admit you can’t drive stick,” she says, “so _yes_. Besides, I need someone to secure our shit when we decide to take the top down halfway across the highway.”

“Take _your_ top down,” Seth mutters.

She watches him get in the car. Her black mane of curls bounces as she turns to eye him over her sunglasses, and after a second of judgement, she smirks.

“Maybe later, if you’re lucky,” she says.

Seth closes the passenger door.

“I love it when you show up,” he says, sitting back and pushing his shades on, and Nicole pulls out onto the street.

They switched their car choice a month back, and this one is a Ford Mustang. Seth figured that if he had to suffer through another damn beach for Fourth of July fireworks, then they could at least get there in _style._ And what’s more American than that little metal horse? The body’s cherry red, with bright lamps and a crystal clear windshield, four leather seats and a rumble that sounds distantly like a childhood summer… 

He’s still enjoying it when they turn down past Madison Square Gardens.

“Is there a reason why we’re stopping on the wrong side of the city?” he asks, twisting in his seat to see if he can spot the Flatiron Building.

“Yep.”

“…Are you gonna tell me what it is?”

“Nope,” says Nicole, popping the ‘p’. “You’ll find out in, like, ten seconds.”

And they keep cruising down the block. Nicole pulls in on 7th Avenue, yanking the handbrake up like she’s been driving this particular car all her life, and says:

“Hey, babe, I changed my mind… Would you take the top down _now_ , please?”

To which Seth says: “this is punishment for not packing, isn’t it?”, _doesn’t_ get an answer to suggest otherwise, and results in him dejectedly unbuckling his seatbelt.

The fact that the roof is basically held on by a few well-placed clips is a new worry for him. But he retracts the cover, ties it down, and returns to the front seat within a couple minutes.

“Can we go _now?”_ he asks impatiently.

Nicole turns her head towards the entrance to the subway.

In the doorway of the building behind, set back into the concrete, Stefon’s just descended the apartment stairs; he checks his hair in the metal reflection of the door, adjusts that absurdly small green backpack he took to Miami last summer, and glances over just in time to make eye contact.

“I’m bringing a friend,” she grins. Stefon breaks into a huge beam and waves manically behind her. “You don’t mind, do you…?”

He stares at her.

“Tell me this is Normal Fourth of July,” he says. “I have _not_ prepared for the alternative.”

“Relax. He’s only tagging along.”

Seth can’t remember how to breathe as Stefon clambers into the backseat - the surprise has robbed him of air. Stefon’s wearing cut-off leggings, a bubble skirt, gladiator sandals, and a sky blue, dragon and skull adorned Ed Hardy tee. He looks like he opened his wardrobe and hit the ‘randomize’ button.

“You!” Seth accuses. “You said you were busy! You said you had evil, evil plans!”

“I do. These are it.”

“If you tell Governor Paterson that we’re vacationing in New Jersey I swear to god I’ll--”

“Hey, Number One Zolesky!” Nicole says brightly. She passes Stefon his own pair of shades - he examines them with a certain degree of apprehension, before they apparently pass the test. Onto his face they go. “How’ve you been, dude?”

“Heyyyy, Lady Nevada. I’m the same…”

As though he’s suddenly remembered his manners, Stefon sits up, his back ramrod straight, and gives Nicole a hearty salute.

“Finally. The respect I deserve,” she says under her breath. “You ready to catch some rays?”

What a ridiculous question, Seth thinks. Stefon’s ready for anything at any time, like the most dexied Boy Scout in the world.

“If I didn’t know your planning habits,” he says to Nicole, “I’d say this was a way of making me feel extra guilty about this morning.”

“Who says it’s not?” she and Stefon reply, simultaneously, and Seth curls down in his seat in amused horror. A whole half-week of _this_.

It actually works out… fine. Stefon never brings much luggage, and he’s gone during that first night, back in time to spend lazy late mornings beachside with them. Napping into the afternoon, eating ice cream, disappearing for twenty minutes and coming back with an icebox full of chilled cider. (Nicole tries to ask where he’d got it from; Seth puts a stop to that line of conversation very quickly.)

They watch the fireworks from the boardwalk that night. Kids stream by with sugar-sticky fingers, making Stefon jump every single damn time; Nicole buys another round, and Seth regales them with tales from backstage that would make several of his bosses shrivel up and die if they heard them, and it never dips lower than the eighties the whole time they’re watching the sky light up before their eyes. They’re tipsy and warm and surrounded by beautiful sparkly independence. What could be better than that?

At one point, a spectacularly drunken man stumbles over and taps Seth on the shoulder.

“Hey, dude,” he says, in what might pass for a West Coast accent, “do you know when the ball is gonna drop?”

“Oh, honey, _no_ ,” says Nicole--

Seth waves his hands. “Yeah, man, this isn’t New Year--”

“About fifteen minutes,” Stefon says to him, gazing at the purples and greens above.

“Thanks, bro!” says the man, and frowns, and decides to correct himself to, “thanks… girl? _Thanks_.”

Stefon flicks lazy fingers at him a couple times. _No problem._

They all hold their breath until the man is out of earshot.

Then the coast is clear, and Nicole explodes into cackling. “I can’t tell if you really think that, or if you’re just the meanest person in the world,” she says, doubled over and short on breath.

Seth rolls his eyes: “I think the guy had it coming if he was so wasted he _asked what time the ball dropped_ ,” he points out. “New Year’s is the same _every year!_ It starts at midnight… It starts at the _start!_ That’s kind of the point!”

Stefon, who so far has managed to keep a straight face, suddenly bursts out laughing through his steepled hands. Nicole presses her face into his arm for stability as they completely crack up, and Seth - well, Seth’s overwhelmed with plain fucking _joy_ right now just watching them. His smile is hurting his face but he doesn’t care, not when his top two people on Earth are both wiping tears from their eyes.

“This is way better than the Fruit Salad Fireworks at **Sploosh** ,” Stefon squeaks. (Seth does not ask for an elaboration.)

They spend their final day on the beach. Seth’s adamant that tanning away a hangover _totally_ works; Nicole heaves a gallon of water at his torso, with the air of someone who knows they’re dealing with an idiot, but she still lays out the towels for them to bathe on.

Stefon is, predictably, _fine_.

“It’s like he’s never seen the ocean before,” Nicole remarks, peering over her shades at how Stefon’s staring at the tide. He dips a toe into the wet sand and recoils: “like, he’s been to a _beach_ before, right?”

“Literally _anything_ is possible,” says Seth, and closes his eyes again.

“I guess. He didn’t bring a swimsuit.”

“He probably doesn’t believe in them or something.”

The sun sears amber into the insides of his eyelids, making the thumping of his brain almost pleasant, almost painless. There’s a dry rustle as Nicole turns over - her hand is cool against the skin of his bare chest, and her hair smells like coconut, and Seth turns to look at her, only to find that her pretty eyes aren’t open behind the lenses.

“I like Stefon,” she says. “I like that you’re friends. He gives you this outlet for crazy stuff, and you give him a way into _domestic_ crazy stuff, and it’s all just working so _nice_.”

“You think I need an outlet?” he asks, surprised.

“Duh. Do you know how many less threats you make to Alex in our messages now? Without Stefon, you’d be even more of an uptight, grumpy bastard man.”

Seth considers it. “Know what? That’s fair.”

“It’s literally my job to draw conclusions from the available facts, I should hope so.”

Seth tilts his head up - Stefon’s taken to crouching over the wet sand, now, and appears to be tracing messages, or some kind of design, over the beach. He watches, rapt, as the tide smooths over whatever he’s writing:

And then he starts again.

Nicole puffs at a stray lock of hair. “This has been so nice. _Friendly._ It’s gonna be real shitty, heading home after this trip.”

“What can I say?” Seth smirks. “I set a high standard. Next time you’re in town, we’ll head out to one of Stefon’s clubs, what do you say?”

“I say ‘yes’. I also say ‘I want a tailored experience’.”

“Oh, he’ll give it to you. Jewpids and all.”

He knocks his head back against the towel, dislodging his sunglasses, and all of a sudden everything is so big and so bright and so open. The world has a lot to offer; he’s lucky, he thinks, that the people he’d like to share those opportunities with get along. For the most part, anyway.

“I wish I got to see you more often,” Nicole mumbles into his chest.

“Yeah,” Seth murmurs back, blinking away a faint stinging sensation. He’s suddenly misty eyed. “I wish that too, babe.”


	11. Chapter 11

**October 2012**

When his cell phone blares noise across the office, Seth snaps up, launches himself off the couch, and fumbles it in the general direction of his ear.

“--Hello?”

_“Hey, Seth Meyers… It’s Stefon.”_

Seth mutes the news with his free hand. “Hey, Stefon, I’m glad you’re okay,” he says, trying to soften his voice - there’s weird, spiky vertices of concern prickling at his words. “I tried to reach you the last couple days. Can you believe all these people out in that for _fun?_ It’s crazy. And there’s talk that the city’s gonna close the subways, have you seen?”

Stefon makes a noise in the affirmative. _“Mm-hmm. That’s why I called.”_

“Oh,” says Seth. “Actually, yeah-- where _are_ you calling from?”

There’s a clattering of metal on porcelain on the other end of the line, and what sounds like two ladies laughing at each other: _“I live on top of a nail salon,”_ Stefon explains, _“I got up early enough that they were still here, and they said I could use the phone.”_

Seth shoots a glance at the display on the news. It reads **17:03** , hovering over the ticker tape and weather warnings.

 _“I think the club I had in mind is going to get flooded,”_ Stefon continues. _“Not a surprise, seeing as it has a literal ditch room… But--”_

“It’s got _what?”_

_“It doesn’t matter now. Anyway, I was wondering if you still wanted to meet. I can’t leave Bark Ruffalo, but I hate to think of Seth Meyers cooped up in his apartment all alone…”_

Hm. It’s a compelling argument - Seth’s technically not even supposed not be in 30 Rock right now. It looks like everyone else is going to be shut in for the next few days, and if the phone lines go down, then he’s not gonna have anyone to talk to but that weird fashion designer lady who lives across the hall. (And she’s kinda creepy.)

“That sounds great, if you’ll have me,” Seth says, then cringes at his choice of words, _then_ decides to press on regardless. “I’m in Studio 6B right now, but I can be at yours for just gone seven?”

 _“Yes yes yesyesyes!_ _Yes_ _. See you then, Seth Meyers. It’s going to be a_ _whirlwind _ _of a night.”_

He hangs up with a _click_ before Seth can admonish him for the pun.

The news report covering the hurricane, unmuted and ominous, describes predictions of wind speeds up to eighty miles an hour. It’s going to be well up to fifty by the time Seth gets out of here, but he won’t have to tackle it for too long - it’s barely a half hour walk to West 23rd from the Center, and the streets _should_ be clear.

* * *

This was a mistake.

A terrible, wet mistake.

All the warnings were right - it’s like being a sedan in a Nor’easter, except the blizzard splashes, and the wheels on black ice are his skidding shoes. New York is waiting at the bus stop, and an angry car is approaching that puddle in the road. Manhattan is ugly crying in a period drama.

(Passing the time with these images is pretty fun, actually.)

Someone in a purple windbreaker jogs past him, and they look up and nod briefly, as though they’re establishing solidarity. Ohhhh, no… No, Seth is _not_ like the lunatics who are out in this for _fun_.

He ducks under some scaffolding and instantly brims over with regret. The whole block seems to be swaying; it’s not quite dark yet, but it’s getting there, and Seth’s not sure the power’s gonna hold out. There’s a store lamp in the brickwork up there that’s snapped clean off its stand, twirling by the wires like a scrapyard windchime. He’s short of breath. The winds are knocking it out of him. Every time a new sheet of rain slams down, it’s like being struck in the sternum.

Cars are far and few between. It’s like the start of an apocalypse movie (which is melodramatic, but true) - police tape, cordoning off a footpath across the avenue, streams vertically in the wind in thick, yellow ribbons. Stoplights swing from their hooks.

He’s never been so glad to see a RadioShack.

Seth wishes he could call Stefon, but he doesn’t think the nail salon is open anymore. Instead, he squints at the buzzer in the store’s doorway, trying to interpret the list of residents. 

All at once, Stefon’s description on Weekend Update makes a crapton more sense. Stefon doesn’t live in _a_ garbage can - the buzzer for the apartments above the RadioShack lists _‘The_ Garbage Can’ against one of the numbers, printed in ink pen and spotted with rain and age.

“Oh, thank god,” Seth mumbles, jabbing it. He doesn’t know what he’d do if he’d agreed to hunker down with Stefon in a dumpster for two days minimum.

The intercom connects. _“Who’s there,”_ says Stefon, making it sound like a sentence instead of a question.

“…Who else were you expecting?”

_“Oh, Joel said he might drop by. Let me buzz you up.”_

And the door clicks as the lock disengages. Seth hurriedly bypasses it and heads for the stairs.

He passes some nice apartments - welcome mats, vacuumed floors - and ascends another floor. There’s three doors up here, painted with chipped white gloss, and the carpet is more cluttered. But the entranceway that stands out the most is the one with tag stickers slapped against it, with errant thumbprints, and shoe scuffs against the skirting.

So Seth knocks.

Stefon opens the door and it’s _warm_. So much warmer than outside. He looks exactly the same as always, save for a lack of bedazzled boots - seeing him in plain black socks feels kind of like Seth’s walked in on him in the shower. (And the bastard’s _still_ taller than him, goddamnit.)

“Nice weather for sea devils,” Stefon says idly.

Seth bundles inside and yanks off his jacket. “Holy _shit_ , it’s bad out there!”

“I _know_ , I’ve never seen Dominos close like that before,” Stefon says, closing the door, “running out of pizza dough… Can you _imagine?”_

Seth stops. This is nice. This is way more normal than the insanity he’s just come in from. 

“What else are they supposed to run out of?” he asks.

“I don’t know. Patience?”

Seth kicks off his shoes and snorts. Stefon’s apartment is clearly the smallest in the building - maybe some kind of converted space from the original floorplan - and it’s so anti-hipster it’s mindblowing. The exposed brick is just that; brick that hasn’t been plastered. Stefon’s pinned up a quilt that doesn’t fit the space, in what looks like an attempt to keep heat in, and stacks of paper line the skirting board of the main room.

“Restroom, living room and kitchenette,” Stefon says, jabbing a pointer finger each way. Then he waggles his eyebrows: “ _bedroom_ … Did the storm chill your bones, Seth Meyers? We could fix that, y’know, _ride it out_ together--”

“Stop it,” Seth grins. “I’m fine, look, I even brought snacks.”

“Ooh!” says Stefon, and plucks a bag of chips out of Seth’s messenger bag.

“It’s _lunacy_ out there. I’m wondering if some neighborhoods are gonna lose power. Maybe the phone lines’ll go down, I’ve already messaged Nicole… And I wouldn’t be surprised if they shut Ellis Island again, Sandy’s going to _clobber_ it. Do you know on the way here, I saw a lady in a fisherman’s coat _walking her beagle?”_

“I mean, count yourself lucky, Seth,” Stefon drawls, wandering into the corner with the kitchen wedged in it, “not many people get to see natural selection at work right before their eyes! That’s the miracle of evolution. You were live at the scene.”

And Seth laughs when he unpacks their provisions, and marvels at the sheer amount of sauerkraut in Stefon’s refrigerator (four jars of varying sizes, all open), and feels like he’s getting told off in a ‘bad boyfriend’ kinda way when Stefon admonishes him for not thinking of bringing any candles.

“Why would anyone think about candles?”

“In case of a blackout! In case of a spontaneous, romantic rave! I have a _flare gun_ in case of--”

“Nuh-uh, _nope_ , do _not_ get that out,” Seth warns, “do _not_ set off a flare in this very flammable apartment during a hurricane.”

(Stefon doesn’t say he won’t. But he doesn’t bring it up again, which is almost good enough.)

By eight, the skies have fogged over and the winds have picked up. Bark Ruffalo is apparently hiding under the bed, like he usually does after his first meal of the day. The TV is on the fritz, and the temperature’s dropped pretty rapidly, so they pile the comforters Seth’s planning on sleeping on into a heap and avoid talking about work.

Eventually, Stefon suggests that they take a smoke break. This is how Seth ends up lying on his back on the couch, while his host sits under the window where the AC unit should be, and rolls a joint.

“I would’ve thought you’d be somewhere tonight,” he remarks to him, over the sound of grinding and the rattle of the panes. “Seems like your kind of atmosphere.”

“I endanger people on my own terms.”

“Not letting the planet tell you what to do,” Seth nods, accepting it. “Fair. Even still, your schedule sounded pretty solid. What was it? _Wake up, go home?_ I wasn’t even sure you’d be in. Or awake.”

He remembers the clock display on the news.

“Hey, you got up early for me,” Seth realizes. “I didn’t even think about it, I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay,” says Stefon, “I was babysitting for my friend last night, so I ended up turning in early.”

Seth watches as he twists the end of the paper and conjures up, of all things, a box of safety matches to light the tip with. “Aw, _cute_ ,” he says, “how old’s the kid?”

Flick- _crack_. The flame roars to life.

“He’s three now… Most of his teeth have come in, so he’s not really ‘Drooly-Lips’ Jackson anymore. We were brainstorming new nicknames over midnight cereal.”

An image sneaks into his brain, of Stefon and a toddler sitting cross-legged on the carpet and eating forbidden breakfast food, and he almost wants to physically wave it away.

“‘Drooly Lips’ Jackson…” he murmurs. “Wait, is that your Ultimate Fighter best friend?”

A plume of smoke escapes Stefon’s mouth. “Yeah,” he says, shuffling his shoulders in the way he does when something’s awkward, but he’s still enjoying the thought of it. “We’re trying to train the biting out of him. He keeps committing some, um… pretty graphic fouls.”

Seth makes a noise that he hopes sounds like _oh, gross, I bet, good luck_. He’s pretty sure Stefon will pick up on all of those.

The joint makes an appearance in his eyeline, parenthesized by Stefon’s huge silver rings, and Seth stretches out to accept it:

“I’m not complaining,” he says, watching gray wisps escape his lips, “but I guess I just didn’t see you spending your Halloweekend _babysitting_. And then, like, having a quiet evening in with me, bracing ourselves for a hurricane. Y’know?”

Stefon _hmms_ and directs his eyes to the ceiling, in search of answers that aren’t pressed into the stucco. “If **....HHHHHH…..HHrrRRH…** had flooded,” he says, “I’d still want to be there. But you were coming too and you’d _hate_ it. A bunch of my friends changed their plans and clubbed together--”

(Seth snorts.)

“--and I was thinking,” Stefon smiles, taking back the joint, “would I rather be with _them_ at a second-rate party? Or would I rather get my hangout with _you_ in while I can?”

As the fuzz creeps into his brain, and Seth becomes starkly aware of the texture of the couch cushion behind his head, he’s taken aback by how touched he is. Something in the admission is soft and lovely and not flirty at all, somehow, and he wants to comment on it, but even _without_ a few lungfuls of pot he’d be struggling.

And then there’s an enormous flash of blue light, stark and cold as it streams into the apartment and illuminates the rainy street.

His stomach drops.

 _Fireworks?_ , Stefon mouths.

Seth sits up. “Holy shit, what was _that?”_

“It’s happening again,” Stefon remarks, as though he’s mildly interested instead of justifiably concerned. He grabs the windowsill and hauls himself up by his fingertips to peer outside.

“Well, don’t look at it!” says Seth.

The light pulses, white and angry, for a good five seconds. When it finally recedes, he realizes that the apartment lamps have gone down.

“Hm,” says Stefon.

At least it’s better than an obvious _‘power’s out’_. “We’re gonna need those candles after all,” Seth says. “I think a T-1000 just appeared outside your house.”

Stefon takes a long, long drag of the joint. He stretches to full height, passes the joint as he brushes by the couch, unlocks his bedroom door, and breathes out, in that exact order. “Fireworks scare Bark Ruffalo,” he states.

Seth abruptly finds himself with a lap full of dog. He’s glad he’s sat up straight, now - this would be much more immobilizing if he was on his back.

“Hey, boy!” he grins, ruffling the neck of the fluffiest, blondest dog he’s ever come across. “Didja see? Hurricane Sandy just fucked the grid!”

“ _And_ that bitch fucked my _kizsona kapusta!_ I’ll kill her!” Stefon yells, brandishing a jar of sauerkraut in the darkness of the open refrigerator. “I was saving that for Thanksgiving. Son of a two-faced _lot lizard_.”

Bark Ruffalo curls up on Seth’s pants, apparently there for the long haul now, and Stefon wanders back over with Seth’s bag and the chips. Seth watches him light candles as he approaches.

“What are you up to then? On Thanksgiving?”

“Oh, David’s coming over,” Stefon says, dabbing at wicks with a safety match and arranging the candles on the counter. “He’s bringing his wife. We cook, we talk, we eat sitting on the floor in front of a VHS of a roaring fire and blast the radio…”

“That sounds nice,” Seth says honestly.

“It is. _Way_ less stressful than dinners with Ms Stefon, she just frets and frets and wants everything to be perfect, but she can _never_ get the gravy right--”

Stefon shuts his mouth with a bite of his top lip. Maybe he’s still in the rhythm of pretending when it comes to Ms Stefon, except he’s evidently remembered that Seth already knows about that part, and has chosen to stop while he’s ahead.

Seth’s got _some_ tact, though, for crying out loud. “Sounds like me,” he says, handing the joint back. Stefon takes a grateful seat next to him. “I _always_ burn the rolls. Every time, without fail. They’re just so damn easy to forget about…”

“Why are you in charge of rolls if you burn them?”

“My mom still has some hope for me,” Seth sighs. “That poor woman.”

Stefon blows a jet of smoke across the room. “I’m assuming they’re your plans this year, then.”

“What, for Thanksgiving? No, I’m going to my brother’s place, he and his girlfriend wanted to host this year,” he says. “Christmas is in New Hampshire, though. My mom’s gonna schedule in her disappointment in my culinary failures, don’t you worry--”

“No Nicole?”

Seth throws him a glance. It doesn’t _seem_ to be flirty - or opportunistic in any way, actually. Stefon looks pretty… well, _earnest_. He scruffs up Bark Ruffalo’s fur again.

“She hasn’t confirmed yet… She needs to see if work will let her take it off after Hanukkah,” Seth says slowly. “How about your Christmas? What was it, David only hosts every other year?”

“Yes,” says Stefon, his expression turning sour, “and then Mr and Mrs Zolesky do Hanukkah in between years. Stefon isn’t invited to _those_.”

“What?! Why not?”

“Well,” he says, offering the last of the joint to Seth - he refuses, and Stefon finishes it off himself - “there were a couple of, shall we say, _past incidents_. There was the year I showed up on molly… Then there was that year I grew my hair out... That time I brought Leon, and he got into a fistfight with my dad… Molly again…”

“Leon?”

And Stefon grins that big, flirty grin, unable to stop himself from slamming a hand over his mouth. “Oh, he’s long gone, Seth Meyers, don’t you worry your shrewd little silver fox snout about it!” he says. _“You’re_ the only man for me now.”

“I wasn’t worried,” Seth mumbles. He was _interested_. There’s a difference.

Stefon throws the burnt out filter of the joint in a perfect arc, directly into the trash, and doesn’t even flinch when Seth lets out an impressed whistle. “I’m starting these chips,” he says. The bag tears when he opens it up. “It’s just us and the darkness, and the rain on my windows, and my crunching--”

“Gimme some of those,” Seth grumbles, snatching at the opening. “If you’re not even gonna let me enjoy the weird peace of a natural disaster, then I guess I should let you know I brought a wind-up radio with me. Wanna see if we can tune into anything?”

Stefon’s eyes shine. A chip is comically frozen halfway to his mouth: “like my Thanksgiving!” he breathes.

“Yeah. Just like that, buddy. Pass my bag over--”

As he digs at the bottom of the main compartment, bypassing his change of clothes and his office crap, something runs through him like a shudder, starting at the back of his neck and zig-zagging between his high limbs and torso.

It hits him _hard_ , like the blast from a nuclear weapons test; Stefon may be more important to him than originally anticipated.

He’s a weapon when he’s near. First there’s the flash of light - it blinds Seth, caught short without goggles, to everything else. Then his whole body washes out to white, as the paint boils off him in thick clouds and singes the underneath.

The thing about nuclear bombs is that the explosion pushes everything away, and then the cloud causes it to fall back into the epicenter.

There’s no way for Seth to escape, basically. He’s on elastic. He’ll ping out and he’ll be dragged back in, and when he’s lying in the wreckage of it all, it’s just going to be him and the fallout and nothing else.

“See if you can tune to WLTW,” Stefon smiles, and leans over the now-snoozing dog to kiss him on the cheek.

Seth tries not to flush, tries not to smile, and tries to imagine if he’d do less damage to the people around him in Nevada. He fails at all three objectives, and the storm outside roars, as it continues to beat at Manhattan.

**November 2012**

It’s less than two weeks from Sandy when he gets a call at the office.

“Hey, Nicole!”

_“Hey, Seth. I’m glad I caught you, I was wondering if you were done yet--”_

“Oh, I’m not,” he smirks, silently waving a stack of work at Alex until the writer accepts it. “Still in 30 Rock. It’s been crazy busy, with the election and everything… Oh, hey, I actually have the Nevada analysis right here on my desk! Great job staying blue, baby.”

 _“Thanks. Definitely all down to me and my amazing rally presence,”_ she says dryly. _“How was the show yesterday?”_

“Oh, just fine. Rihanna was great. Had to deal with Drunk Uncle again, but you know how it is…”

_“I do. Wish I’d been there on Tuesday night - it looked like quite the party.”_

“It was. Did I tell you about the bitch of a champagne headache I woke up with?” he asks. For a second, the bustle of the writers’ room drops away, and he feels himself soften: “I can’t wait to see you at Thanksgiving, you know. I miss you.”

There’s a pause.

_“Seth, I’m-- I’m not coming to Thanksgiving.”_

Uh oh. Now there’s a pause from _him_ , too.

“Oh,” he says blankly. “Well, there’s always Christmas?”

 _“I’m not coming to Christmas, either,”_ she says, and her voice wobbles, catching on the admission like a coat on a barbed wire fence. _“Or New Year’s. Or Valentine’s. Or anything else.”_

Seth leaves the room and ducks into his office, shutting the door behind him. It’s cold in here. The lights flicker to life with the motion.

He can’t breathe.

“Right,” he says.

Nicole sounds like she’s about to cry. _“I love you, Seth,”_ she tells him, _“but if a feeling were enough, then we wouldn’t have come to this conversation. You’ve got your job and life and New York, I’ve got my job and life and Reno, and you’re my best friend. But we can’t go on like this forever.”_

“No,” he agrees.

Because she’s right. Of course she’s right. They love what they do and where they live too damn much to leave - but they care about each other too much to even think about tearing the other away from it.

That doesn’t mean it doesn’t hurt.

It feels like he’s swallowed sad cornflakes at a scratchy, painful angle.

“I really love you,” he says.

 _“Yeah, well, I love you back,”_ she replies, _“so don’t wait up, okay? Just, like… Go out and bang the hottest chicks ever. Not_ _that_ _much hotter than me, but… whatever. We haven’t seen each other in ages, so go nuts, I don’t care.”_

“I do,” Seth says, snorting despite his damp eyes. “I want you to be sad about me for a good three months’ minimum before you move on.”

 _“Can’t promise anything,”_ she laughs.

“Yeah, me neither.”

_“Will you call me when you get the chance? Just… when you’re at home? I want to talk about how your day went, what you think your job’s gonna hold in the future-- I wanna show you funny clips I saw online and chat about TV shows, y’know?”_

“Yeah,” he says. “We’ll stay up for hours. Run through some of our memories and shit like that. It’ll be like a really annoying sleepover, we can totally do that.”

Nicole’s sigh crackles over the line. _“Okay,”_ she says, _“okay, just-- call me when you can. This week.”_

“Bye,” Seth whispers, and hangs up.

Shit. _Shit_ , he’s got to go back into the writers’ room and _talk_ to people now. Pretend he’s not on the edge of a fit of misery, and go on for the next couple hours as if everything’s hunkydory.

At least that wasn’t the worst break up in the world. He would’ve been _crushed_ if they’d blown up at each other. Now he’s got the same amazing woman in his life, but they’re not forcing a performance at one another until the joke fizzles out and dies, he guesses.

But oh, it still hurts.

He takes a deep breath, pinches his nose, and squares his shoulders. Right. _Come on, Meyers - nothing happened. Everything’s fine. Keep your whiny personal crap to yourself._

Yeah. That’ll work. And it’s barely even November - _plenty_ of time to cheer up in time for Christmas.


	12. Chapter 12

**Christmas 2012**

“Bud. _Seriously_. It’s just a little snow--”

“I never get to see it this _white_ , though,” Stefon protests. “Let me have this.”

He’s sat in the passenger seat, body swung halfway out the car, and his boots are dangling over approximately half an inch of snow, settled over the gravel of the driveway. Stefon tugs his jacket tighter around his shoulders and tentatively dabs at it with a sparkly toe.

Seth stands over him. “Do you want a hand?” he asks impatiently.

 _“No_. I’m fine.”

“Suit yourself,” Seth says, and pops the trunk.

With the tone that every relative who’s a woman seems to use at family gatherings, Seth’s mother floats down the porch steps with her arms spread, and calls out: “Hell _oooooooo_!”

“Hi, Mom,” Seth calls. Privately, he wonders why she always sounds surprised that he’s arrived, when a) she was the one who invited them, and b) they’d called an hour before to let his parents know how far away they were.

“How are you?” she asks - he spots his father loitering in the doorway, electing not to follow his wife into the snow - “how was your journey, honey?”

“Painful,” Seth says shortly.

Stefon, who has managed to stand up and exit the car, squishes the soles of his boots into the compact ice. “Only because _someone_ ,” he says, with a curl of his lip, “was trying to introduce me to _pop music_ down the entirety of Route 15.”

 _“How_ can you never have heard of Gorillaz?” Seth bursts out. “I _genuinely_ don’t understand.”

“Okay,” calls his dad, “I’m hoping this is you two getting this out of your system _now_ so that you’re not bringing it into the house. God knows we have to put up with your brother and his girlfriend doing the exact same thing tomorrow.”

Seth flushes. His mouth snaps shut faster than you can say _‘but_ _he_ _started it’_.

Even though Stefon usually pounces on any kind of situation involving a blush, poking at their interactions to worsen the color, he decides not to this time. (His tact is slightly worrying sometimes). “Hello, Seth Meyers’ Mom,” he says.

“Stefon! It’s _so_ nice to see you. You must come in and see my Venus Flytrap, it’s grown so many more little mouths. How long has it been?”

The snow softens the sound of suitcase wheels hitting the drive. “Around eighteen months,” Seth supplies. “This was yours, right?”

“Oh, yes! I brought Advocaat,” Stefon says, smiling awkwardly and taking the handle of the bottle carrier with both hands. “I thought the Meyers Parents might be the kind who like Snowballs.”

“Stefon, you shouldn’t have!” she twitters, accepting the crate. She starts traipsing back towards the house, still talking: “ _you_ can come again, oh my word-- Honey! Look what Stefon brought!”

“No help needed, it’s cool,” Seth mutters, dragging their luggage through the snow. “I got it, don’t worry…”

But Stefon hasn’t left. His slender hand curls over the top of the trunk, pulling until it gently clicks shut.

“Let’s bring the rest in later,” he suggests.

“Yeah,” Seth agrees, looking over his shoulder, “if we don’t go in _now_ then we might be stuck out here a while. She’ll want to organize a New Year’s party right here in the bleak midwinter.”

Stefon puts an unsteady hand over his mouth, as though Seth’s said something scandalous, yet entertaining.

“Can I tell you something?”

“Yeah, sure.”

“I _did_ like that song about the plastic beach,” he admits.

Seth grabs the cases. “You mean ‘Plastic Beach’?” he grins, and Stefon huffs and hits him in the arm, and they finally start to drag their things up the steps and into his parents’ house.

Picturing Stefon in a normal hotel room was weird enough before. Now he’s brought a club kid into his mom and dad’s hallway - polished wooden floors, fluffy carpets, white walls and framed family photos. _Central heating._ Stefon dutifully removes his boots and peers at the pictures lining the stairs.

“Do you two want coffee?”

“Yes please!” Seth yells back. Then, quieter, he nudges Stefon in the side: “that’s my college graduation photo,” he says, pointing at his robes and cap, “and that there is my first headshot for the show, before I hosted Weekend Update.”

Stefon stares. “You have, like, twenty percent more _eyebrow_ ,” he breathes.

“I know, right? Look at me, I was so little and blue,” he grins. “I love that my mom put these two together. It’s like a ‘before’ and ‘after’ comparison of parental expectations.”

“That,” Stefon says, turning to him and tapping at the glass of the headshot, “that’s _doing_ things to me, Seth Meyers. I can’t believe you’ve been keeping this from me--”

“It’s on the headshot wall at work! I’m next to Amy,” he protests, but it falls on deaf, disbelieving ears. “Look, you take the cases upstairs - yours is the second right - and I’ll go back out and get the rest of the stuff. Okay? Then you can be weird about the pictures in the living room to your heart’s content, I promise.”

Stefon nods vigorously and starts to yank up one of the suitcases, pulling it up the steps and avoiding the paintwork like an alternative version of the game ‘Operation’.

Then his mom reappears in the hallway. “I guess I’m taking the coffee through, then,” she says. “If you’re heading out to the car, Seth, bring some firewood back with you.”

“Aw, but _Mom_...”

“No buts!” she warns him, waving her hands like she can swat away the audacity of it all. “Get outta here… Who’d you think’s carting in heat for the evening? The Wood Fairy?!”

“That was my nickname in high school,” Stefon says idly, and Seth makes a noise halfway between a choke and a laugh.

He’s still finding it funny long after heaving an armful of logs indoors, when they’ve finished their coffee and brought each other up to speed. When they’ve discussed how Seth’s brother and his girlfriend are landing early tomorrow morning. When Stefon’s told his father about all the athletes he’s met: the individuals of note include Butane Bolt, US electrical arson champion; eczema-suffering tennis player Novak Jock-Cup-Itch; and Carmelo Anthony. (Just, like, the actual guy from the New York Knicks.)

They eat home-cooked lasagna in front of the television, yelling at reruns of Jeopardy! and getting bowled over when Stefon cleans up in the ‘13- to 17-Letter Words’ category. How the _hell_ does he know who made Worcestershire Sauce?

“Uhhh, it’s _written on the bottle,_ have you never _had_ a Bloody Mary?” Stefon yells back, and accepts a high five from Mrs Meyers.

The two of them later team up to do the dishes and start preparing desserts - Seth’s mom is desperate for someone who can both appreciate _and_ understand her culinary magic - which leaves Seth and his father lounging with the sports news down low.

“Get your feet _away_ from the coffee table.”

“Sorry,” Seth says automatically, shifting.

“Damn right. What would your girlfriend say? At least it’s the other way around with your brother, _he_ knows how to treat the furniture in the house for what it is…”

Seth doesn’t say anything.

Nicole’s told her family. Seth _hasn’t_. It’s not unlike his dad to bring up the future - particularly when it comes to family matters - but he was hoping he’d be able to escape or brush off the majority of it this year. The only person he’s even mentioned it to is Amy, and that’s because she called him in the middle of a crying-and-eating-toaster-strudels-in-his-underwear episode, and then called him _out_ on his bullshit.

And he didn’t breathe a word about Stefon.

(Not that he’d needed to - Poehler just _gets_ him, especially when he’s being a stupid asshole. It’s very inconvenient.)

He thinks of the Pride gathering they saw at Broadway, and hates himself a little bit.

“Hey, Dad?” Seth says.

His dad doesn’t stir from in his armchair - he’s still watching the highlights on TV - but from his silence, it’s easy to tell he knows something’s about to go down. The humming of the set and the clink of china from the kitchen are all that fill the gap.

His chest tightens.

“I’m… I’m sorry.”

Steely blue eyes fix themselves on him.

“What the hell are you sorry for?” his dad says, enunciating each word as clearly as possible so that Seth can’t wriggle out of an explanation.

Shit. He tries to shrug, but it comes off as childish and stupid instead. “I don’t know… Stuff,” he says vaguely. “I don’t wanna disappoint you.”

Distantly, there’s a splashing noise, and a whooping rise of laughter floats in from the kitchen.

Worst of all - Seth’s dad _sits forward_.

“Now, listen here, son,” he says, interlocking his fingers. “I live in a _perpetual_ state of disappointment. My eldest boy’s a comedian who demeans himself for money on prime time television. There’s nothing you can do to bring me shame _now_. I’ve got no choice but to be proud of you! I’ve already felt all the rest. Y’hear?”

“Yeah, I hear,” Seth sighs.

It’s weird, but he actually feels a lot better about it. That’s how the Meyers family work - it’s not always the nicest thing to hear, and it’s not always the politest, either. But it’s always _honest_.

“Sorry,” he says again, turning the words over slowly in his mouth, “I’m just… thinking about what comes next. I’ve been thinking about a lot of things, actually… But I can’t see any of it playing out very well.”

“The thing about decisions is… If you spend too much time weighing up your options, then they disappear. And it’s usually because some other schmuck’s made the decision for you.” His dad taps his temple knowingly: “don’t let that happen, kid.”

“I won’t. Thanks, Dad.”

“No problem. Anything else on your mind?”

Seth takes a deep breath. “Yeah, actually,” he says, taking the leap, “Nicole and me…”

His dad’s eyebrows shoot into his hairline. “Are you getting married?”

“What?! No, Dad, it’s the opposite,” Seth says, shocked into the admission. It’s like ripping off a band-aid. “We decided to split.”

“When?”

“…The start of November,” Seth mumbles. 

His father collapses back into the armchair, and mutters something that sounds suspiciously like _ohhh, jeez_. 

“It’s cool, we’re good, I watched a lot of Formula One about it, _whatever_. Yeah, the distance was a lot and I think it was on its way to being finished, but I’m trying to move on and not be a sad sack of crap about it. That wasn’t what I wanted to say.”

“So what _did_ you wanna say?” he prompts. 

Seth furrows his brow at the news. “What do I do, if… If there might be someone who would yell at me to treat the furniture right?” he says, trying to focus on the middle distance, but unable to stop himself from checking the reaction. “If I brought them home?”

His dad stares at him expectantly.

Seth stares right on back.

“I don’t know what’s gonna happen,” he adds. _“If_ something’s gonna happen. I’m pretty sure Nicole would be okay with it. But I don’t know what everyone else would think.”

His dad speaks with all the authority of someone posing as a more knowledgeable source of information. “Okay,” he says seriously, “so talk to me. Why do you think we’d give a shit?”

Seth starts listing the reasons off on his hands. The ease of the conversation is genuinely irritating. “Heavy drug use,” he starts, “at least, at one point - now it’s just _infrequent_ drug use. Extreme culture clashes. Fear of strangers. _Territorial_.”

“Territorial isn’t always a bad thing. As long as you’re not being isolated from the people you care about, it can be nice to have someone be protective over you. And a fear of strangers means that you’ll never be competing with each other for attention, right?” His father shrugs, weighing up the pros: “I know how goddamn jealous you get when you’re overshadowed, at least this way your segment stuff is secure.”

“I guess,” Seth mutters. 

“And Seth - we live in a swing county in New Hampshire,” he points out. “One of my boys is on the West Coast, and you’re in New York freakin’ City! At this point, _you’re_ a culture clash for us. We’ll _deal_ with it.”

“...Oh. Okay.”

“And as for the drug use,” he finishes, “we _definitely_ don’t give two federal hoots about _that_. If you ever stayed for President’s Day then you’d see your brother and I on a half-tab of acid each. Now _that’s_ a celebration!”

Seth is hit with an expression of surprise so forcefully that he imagines he could fit a whole softball in his mouth.

“Wait, _what?!”_

A dismissive flap is his reply. “Oh, don’t act so surprised! Your mother was tripping balls on New Year’s, for crying out loud.”

“I don’t remember _that_ ,” Seth says. What a turn of events. That one was supposed to be the dealbreaker - now he’s totally lost. The best word he can come up with his current state is ‘aghast’, but he doesn’t want to say that out loud, because it makes him sound like marriage drama just went down on the family estate in Alabama. 

“Of course you don’t remember it,” his dad says, with a healthy eye-roll for good measure, “you were so wasted we had to walk you home when the party was _in your apartment._ I’d be surprised if you remembered anything about the past year at all.”

Huh. He’d wondered why he couldn’t recall his brother heading out at the end of the night. He never saw him leave… Figures.

“My point is - why are you wasting all this time worrying about what all the other assholes are gonna think?” says his father, like it’s obvious - maybe it is and Seth’s just dense, but maybe he needs a wakeup call and this is the form it’s taking. “Just ‘cos you’re on television doesn’t mean you have to broadcast your _whole life_ to everyone! It’s not a crime to keep things to yourself from time to time.”

“Right. Yeah.”

“In fact, I’d prefer it if you did so a little more often,” he adds.

“Oh my god, don’t bully me in my moment of crisis,” Seth grins, and braces himself on his knees before standing. Jesus, his joints sound like popcorn. “Want anything from the kitchen?”

“Some peace and quiet so I can catch up with the basketball?”

“Cool suggestion, Dad. Real nice. I’ll grab you a tall glass of it with ice,” he says sarcastically, before slinking into the darkness of the hall. 

He doesn’t _plan_ on being nosy without reason.

Like most things in his life, it kind of just happens when he manages to lay the foundation for it. He was actually planning on loudly jumping into the kitchen, to see if he could startle his mom into brandishing a serving spoon his way, but as he creeps, he realizes they haven’t noticed his presence yet.

And they’re discussing _him._

“--but yeah, you’ve never _seen_ a teenager so wasted! I don’t know how he got out of the _barn doors_ where the party was, let alone all the way home.”

“God fuckin’ _damnit_ ,” he mumbles. “Always with the drunk stories.”

“Pass the flour, honey-- Anyway, I bet you have some far more exciting stories than that. Every time we’ve caught your segment on the Update desk, I’ve _always_ said I want to see one of those pop-up clubs New York is so famous for! Just for one night, you know? Nicole’s not really a drinker, not a ‘night out’ kind of drinker, but…”

Stefon isn’t saying anything.

He hears the sound of wood on marble - the airy knocking of a rolling pin on the kitchen counter.

“They’ve broken up, haven’t they?”

“…I think so,” Stefon confirms.

“For God’s sake,” his mom says, and he hears her angrily start rolling out pastry again. “We try to get him to shut his trap for _thirty-nine years_ and he still can’t get the hang of _when_ it’s appropriate to. Is he keeping it from everyone so far?”

“Mmmm-hmm,” Stefon hums scratchily. “I worked it out a couple weeks back--”

“ _Figures._ Our Seth’s a crier.”

“--but he hasn’t _told_ me yet,” he says. (Seth can picture the way his hands are splayed out for emphasis.) “I don’t think he’ll talk to me about it… We’ll see.”

“Does he talk to you about things usually, then?”

There’s a pause, as Stefon gathers himself - the steepling of his hands, the angles of his shoulders, it’s all so _clear_ in Seth’s mind--

“Yes,” he says, decisively.

And that was not the answer Seth was expecting to hear.

Now he can envisage his mother’s raised eyebrows. “Oh? What about?”

“We talk about _everything_ ,” Stefon says animatedly, like he’s doing one of his bits. “Abductions. The Statue of Liberty. My _mute dog._ How his _normal_ things are strange to me, but it’s just stuff he, like, expects? How he always burns the rolls at Thanksgiving - and I know this because Seth confessed it to me, and seemed _very_ accepting of the fact that he was shitty at managing the task, and Stefon finds his distress _cripplingly_ funny. I like hearing him talking.”

Seth’s heart clenches. (At his age, that could mean any number of things.)

“Oh! And how he’s the kind of person who loves street hockey, but revs his car menacingly at other people playing it who are in his way,” Stefon finishes. He sounds _far_ too pleased with himself for remembering an off-the-cuff story like that.

Seth peers around the corner, just in time to witness his mother consider the facts:

“He _is_ a little asshole,” she agrees.

Ouch.

Stefon shakes his head with disappointment, and says, “I don’t know _where_ he picked it up from,” and Seth’s mom laughs and pats his arm warmly and goes back to her pastry.

“Have you ever braided the edges of an apple pie, Stefon?”

“Stefon has done many, _many_ things,” he says, complete with a thousand-yard stare. Then he snaps out of it with a shake of his fringe. “…No. I’ve never done pie edges.”

“Then I will show you,” Seth’s mom smiles, and motions him in close to lean over her work. 

Oh, Christ, Seth _is_ a crier. The image of his best friend and his tiny mother leaning over a dessert dish, swapping stories and cooking techniques, is so goddamn domestic that he thinks he might blubber and puke and down a fifth of whiskey. (Not necessarily in that order.)

He decides to go upstairs and unpack to distract himself. The Meyers aren’t super sentimental people, so they don’t mind that Seth and his brother have updated their bedrooms over the years - at least there’s nothing teenage and cringeworthy in here for Stefon to get worked up about.

He does, however, have that one photo of him and Nicole at the Grand Canyon.

It’s not fair to put it face down, or hide it - they’re still on good terms, after all. Nobody will be any the wiser, though, if he relegates it slightly to a lower shelf on the bookcase.

(A decade-old snap of him and Poehler at a wrap party ends up pride of place, instead, propped up on the bedside table. She’s been real great about all of his whining lately. It’s what she _deserves_.)

When he drifts back downstairs, he spots his mom shutting up for the night.

“Is it really past ten already?” he teases. “I see we’re putting up the defences to keep the snow bandits at bay.”

“Oh, hush,” she laughs, and draws a curtain over the front door. “It’s just that time of year - besides, I have to be up early to go to the airport. Stefon and I have prepped some _killer_ desserts for tomorrow and Christmas, though.”

“Is that because they’re full of poison?” he deadpans.

 _“Yes,”_ says Stefon.

Seth jumps out of his skin. “Jesus _Christ_ , where did you come from?!”

“The darkest, deepest pits of hell,” he says, wiggling his fingers, “where the fire burns hot and the torture never ends! And I brought up with me… _a blackberry crumble,_ decorated like the American flag!”

“The top layer turns a _lovely_ golden brown down there,” says Seth’s mom.

“Oh my _god_. Go to bed.”

“How times change,” she sighs, and adjusts the mat by the front door. “I remember when that was me telling _you_ that so you’d stop being in my way… Oh well. The living room should be free, if you two want to watch TV or have a drink.”

She passes Seth on the stairs, and he steps down to let her by.

“Thanks, Mom.”

“No problem. I practically had to pry your father from his armchair with a spatula,” she says, rolling her eyes, “apparently lighting the fire tuckered him out, I don’t know.”

Stefon’s eyes sparkle with what is most likely malevolence.

“Lighting a fire?”

“Oh, no, _no_ , nononono,” Seth says hastily, “she means, like, a _roaring_ fire. A winter, indoor fire. Don’t give him _ideas_ , Mom, jeez…”

“Roaring?”

“Goodnight, boys. We’ll do breakfast when the L.A. lovebirds drop in.”

There’s a chorus of _night, Mom!_ and _goodnight, Mrs Meyers_ , before she gives one last little wave and turns off the staircase light behind her.

Seth turns to him instantly. “She told you the barn party story, didn’t she?”

“Oh, _yes,_ ” says Stefon, eyes madly twinkling.

“God _damn_ it.”

The living room is the last remaining sanctuary for light, pooling in yellow spots and washing into the hallway. Seth closes the door to keep the heat in.

Stefon, on the other hand, stares directly into the space under the mantle.

“Can I touch it?”

“You can, but you shouldn’t,” says Seth, puzzled, and watches as Stefon darts over to take a closer look. “Have you _never_ seen a fireplace before…?”

“Not like this!” Stefon breathes, captivated, on his hands and knees in front of the masonry. “I didn’t know people actually kept fires in a little cage! I thought they only came in ‘open air’ or ‘free range’ varieties!”

“We’d better make this an occasion to remember, then,” Seth grins, and flicks the light switches, turning the room from white-yellow to warm orange in a split second. While Stefon’s preoccupied with the flames dancing in front of him, he throws some cushions from the couch onto the rug, and, as a stray idea hits him, pulls up one of the blinds.

“It’s snowing,” he says.

And it is. White flecks, snagging themselves on the wind, bounce off the glass and back into the navy-blue night.

Stefon peers over his shoulder with rapt interest, as he adds some more firewood and jabs at the ashes with the poker. “Careful with the fireguard, there,” he says, “it’ll be super hot.”

“Why do you need to guard the fire?”

“It’s not to guard the _fire_ ,” he grins. “It’s to guard you _from_ the fire.”

“Oh,” says Stefon, like he’s unlocked some great mystery of the universe, and he flops back onto the rug spread-eagle. Orange light licks up his skinny jeans. He basks in the heat like a perfectly content cat.

Seth averts his eyes.

And then he doesn’t, because it’s dark and he’s in the safety of the front room and he never gets to see Stefon so _still_ like this. He’ll stare all he wants; it’s _Christmas_.

“You’ll fall asleep there if you’re not careful.”

“Mmm…”

“I won’t be carrying you upstairs.”

“Not even bridal style?”

“Why do you insist on trying to injure me?” Seth asks, and Stefon giggles and curls his arms in on himself.

After a moment of glancing at the details of his friend’s outline, something in Seth’s brain wobbles with emotion again. He’s not gonna stop himself if he wants to do it - _definitely_ not if it’ll make him feel better - so hoping that Stefon doesn’t think it’s weird, he props himself up by an elbow on the cushions, and lies perpendicular to him.

“Hey,” he whispers.

Stefon puffs out a breath in acknowledgement.

Tentatively, with a nervous hand, Seth extends the arm that he’s not leaning on and runs it lightly through Stefon’s hair.

Stefon’s more vocal, this time, but his eyes remain closed. “What are you doing?” he says, with a healthy degree of caution, as though Seth’s hand on him is still an occurrence that’s too good to be true. 

Seth shrugs, as best as he can from leaning on one elbow.

“...Nothin’.” 

He hums suspiciously, but he doesn’t move away. In fact, he tilts his head into the touch, and Seth marvels at how the highlighted lines of blond go all the way to the roots.

“Your dye job is amazing,” he says.

“Not a dye job,” Stefon mumbles, his eyes still closed, “I have, like freckles on my head… Those streaks go white in the sun like Grandma’s leather couch.”

“That’s _natural?”_

“Yes’m,” he chirps. “Birthmarks. Sometimes I use hair chalk to even out the color… Not dye. They don’t hold pigment well. Never mind.”

“That’s the coolest thing you’ve ever told me,” Seth says honestly, and nudges at the strands, curious and awed in a way no-one else manages to make him.

He suddenly realizes that they were last this close did this in Florida, high as kites and drifting aimlessly above the covers on a mattress in a twin room. He’d asked Stefon to come over to him, that time. Just wanted some human contact, someone to hold onto him as he violently clipped through his own body. He dizzies with just the recollection. It’s intoxicating.

Now Stefon’s finally relaxing, body language open and languid, and it’s even _better_.

“Seth?”

“Yeah, buddy?”

“Do you think your brother will like me?” Stefon asks, in a very small voice.

“Yeah, of course he will,” Seth says. He feathers up Stefon’s hair some more, feeling childishly soothed by the sensation. “I actually think you’re gonna get along _too_ well. It’s not gonna end well for me.”

“Will he be offended if I flirt with him?”

“He’ll be offended if you _don’t_.”

“Okay, good. Because it was either him or your dad, and I didn’t wanna hurt your mom’s feelings.”

“Jesus,” says Seth, actually flinching for a second, “please don’t flirt with my father, Stefon.”

“Okay,” he says. He scooches closer, until his nose is brushing against Seth’s sweater, and his exhaled breaths warms the fabric. “Just you and your brother, then,” he says.

Seth glances at the window, where the night isn’t noticing him and the fire’s reflection dances on the glass. It would be silly to cry when he isn’t sad - not entirely, anyway - but for some unknown reason, he still wants to.

Stefon is falling asleep against his sweater. His hair is so soft.

Outside, it continues to snow.


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Almost there. Thanks for sticking with it these last two weeks!  
> Discreet vomiting ahead. (I don't do graphic.)

**February 2013**

_How’s Rome?_

**Fucking beautiful. Glad we’re not going to Verona.**

_I need to hear this reasoning immediately_

**Imagine if I took her to the Romeo and Juliet balcony and didn’t propose? I’d come back in a body bag**

_Next year then?_

Seth snorts, and tosses his cell phone back onto the couch cushions. God, his brother is a dumbass sometimes.

But then, Seth himself isn’t exempt from that, either. He’s just spent a hell of a Monday at work, and now he’s dragged himself into his living room, flicked on some pointless programming as background noise, and flopped down on the couch with takeout. The snow’s _really_ coming down out there. It’s disgusting, and _slushy_ , and thickly, repulsively _gross_. New York City really blows when it comes to winter weather.

He’s picking at prawn crackers and spellchecking his draft - why does he _always_ fucking write ‘heavily’ with two ‘L’s? - when his cell phone trills.

Unknown number. Not uncommon, so he slides up to accept.

“Hello?”

 _“--don’t_ _have_ _sixteen hours, I have a prior en-- oh!”_ says Stefon’s crackly voice, like he’s called up through a tin can on a string. _“Seth! Seth Meyers, it’s me! Stefon!”_

“Yeah, Stefon, I _know_ it’s you,” he laughs. “What’s up, buddy?”

_“I’ve developed the eensy-weensy problem of, how shall I say… being stuck in Poland.”_

“You _what?_ Are you okay?!”

 _“I knowwww,”_ Stefon whines, _“I’m fine but my plane is refusing to take off. Something about that lost fish making the weather bad. I don’t think I can land in New York any earlier than the thirteenth--”_

“You mean Nor-easter Nemo?” Seth asks flatly. “The storm?”

_“That sounds familiar.”_

He clears his stack of revisions from his lap. No way he’s going back to working at any point soon this evening.

“What are you doing in _Poland?”_

 _“I was visiting my Babcia and Dziadek! I hadn’t seen them in forever. There’s usually Zolesky family trips to see them, but, well, Hanukkah rules extend to vacations, and you know the rest. So I came to see them, I had a nice time, and then New York decided it wanted to ruin my life from over four thousand miles away! That_ _bitch_ _. Now I’m gonna miss February Twelfth with Seth Meyers!”_

“Hey, it’s okay!” Seth says quickly, “we can still spend it together, it’ll just be on a phone call. Are you collect calling?”

There’s a pause on the other end of the line, before Stefon admits: _“noooo… Stefon_ _might_ _have bought a cell phone in the airport to call you with.”_

Seth gapes. “You’re kidding me.”

_“I’m as serious as a one-hit knockout.”_

“First cell phone. Right,” he says, grappling with this new information, much in the way that one might grapple with a veterinarian-bound cat. “Tell you what, I’ll add your new number, and then I’ll call _you_ so that you don’t run out of minutes. If you’re waiting a long time for your flight, then I can keep you company, if-- if you want?”

 _“Yes,”_ says Stefon, before he’s even finished the sentence, and hangs up.

Seth misses this when Stefon’s not here. Holy shit, he has a _cell phone_ now - that means he’s _textable_. That means Seth might get weird calls at any and all hours of the day from now on. How ominous and exciting.

(Then again, Stefon is just as likely to throw his new toy out as soon as he touches down in NYC again. He’s always been funny about communicating by letter.)

He redials, air catching in his throat when Stefon picks up immediately: “So I take it your day hasn’t gone well?”

_“It was okay. My Babcia made me take back a load of food because she’s practicing her baking for Purim. I’m eating triangle cookies by Donaldsczyk… That’s Polish McDonalds.”_

Seth grins. “Neat. I didn’t know that had a translation, but you’ve, uhhh… Opened my eyes.”

There’s a crackle of static, followed by a soft munching sound. Stefon’s laughing. _“This isn’t fair!”_ he says. _“I can’t cover my face if I’m holding a little rectangle to my ears. Maybe I should’ve got one of those headset microphones as well? Never mind.”_

Seth can _picture_ it, and it’s so on the nose that he’s hit with a pang of _Imissyou Imissyou Imissyou._ He doesn’t want to say that part out loud, though, so instead, he leans over the arm of the couch to glance at the clock in the kitchen. Nine PM in New York, apparently.

“Is it late where you are?” he asks.

_“No, it’s only, like… three in the morning.”_

“Oh, not too late, then,” he says sarcastically. 

_“Not too late to call Seth Meyers,”_ Stefon retorts. _“This time two years ago I was a million feet in the air and hanging out with him. Now I’m on floor Negative One in this stupid airport, all by_ _myself_ _, awwwwww.”_

“Oh, Jesus Christ… Look, would it make you feel better if I spoke to the writers?” Seth asks, and can almost hear how Stefon sits up, alert and ready to celebrate. “I can recommend you for a spot before Spring Break if you want.”

_“You mean it?!”_

Seth _pffffts_ into the receiver, which he hopes translates to _‘of course I mean it’._

_“Yay, Stefon!”_

“Yeah, yeah,” he snorts, “yay, Stefon, whatever. Tell me about Poland.”

And Stefon does, for almost an hour.

Seth kicks back, and dutifully listens, and _uh-huh_ s in all the right places. It’s not a perfect way to spend time with each other… But it’s close enough.

**March 2013**

“You ready?” he asks.

Stefon shuffles uncomfortably. “Almost _never._ ”

“What a lie. You’ll do great,” Seth grins, and claps him on the shoulder. “Deep breaths. You got this, I’ll cover you if anything goes wrong - business as usual.”

“Mmm-hmm,” he says, pulling down his sleeves, and then Seth’s being prepped to introduce Weekend Update for the night, and he doesn’t see Stefon until his scheduled entrance.

Spring Break is fucking weird - Stefon pulls out all the stops and almost destroys himself trying to give Seth the most interesting clubs New York City currently has to offer. (Seth doesn’t know how to feel about the fact that he knows ‘Jasper the Gorilla Passing a Kidney Stone’ is what makes this place fancy. After all, he was once told in Miami that you have to _really_ smuggle live animals in - trench coats are too suspicious, and you have to dress them up like Cyndi Lauper.)

His effort is endearing, and it’s positively _perfect_ content, and the way Stefon closes up the segment when he messes up Seth’s script at the end is the sweetest thing ever.

The rest of the evening, however, goes completely sideways.

* * *

What’s this place called?

He _knew_ this. He knew the goddamned name of it. At one point he must’ve done, anyway - otherwise there’s no chance he’d have been able to get in. Trying to think back on it just brings to mind a half-remembered password from one of Stefon’s descriptions, and swigging whatever he could get his hands on, while simultaneously avoiding everyone in sight.

He wishes he’d asked Amy Poehler to come with him. (Wherever this is, anyway.) She’s the only person he knows who might enjoy a place like this.

Save the obvious.

He’s considering playing Human Skeeball, and possibly participating in the wet t-shirt contest, when Stefon stumbles across him. Seth’s so wasted that he doesn’t even notice him walk into the club.

Everyone else does.

Heads turn when Stefon enters. (That much is a universal constant. It’s just for different, more respect-rooted reasons here.) He’s garish and clomping and impossible to ignore, like a pair of clogs designed by Grayson Perry, and he glides right on over to the booth that Seth’s melted himself into.

“Whilst I’m _very_ impressed that you remembered my directions _and_ my personal-use password from a whole Halloween hurricane ago,” he begins, “I really need you _not_ to die in this East Bronx realtor’s showroom. It’s on the cusp of making a ‘Hottest Club’ ranking.”

“Maybe death will make it even Hotter,” Seth manages, without so much as a hello.

“Hmmm, maybe. Not _your_ death, though.”

Oh, that’s funny. That’s funny and a little _sad_ , like most of the stuff Seth’s associated with these days. He forces himself to sit up, chattering words he remembers for no reason other than he can recite them off by heart: “December 24, nine PM, Eastern Standard Time… From here on in, I shoot without a script,” he says, forgoing singing to slip into full ‘acting’ mode. “See if anything comes from it, instead of my old shit.”

Stefon takes a physical step away from him.

“Are you stuck in _Christmas?”_ he asks, revulsed. “Seth Meyers, you sound like a crazy person. Why are you making a square with your hands?”

“To frame you,” Seth says, his tongue poking out as he squints through his fingers.

“...Did you _kill_ someone?”

“Only the old Seth,” he mumbles nonsensically. “No, it’s RENT, have you never seen RENT? We can watch it together, I’ll show you RENT--”

“Please stop saying ‘rent’. Money words make me break out in hives.”

“Yeah, fuck it!” Seth says, disregarding Stefon’s response entirely and attempting to stand. (It goes incredibly poorly.) His mouth keeps running as he collapses back into the booth: “yeah, let’s go watch a movie, Stefon, let’s watch a fuckin’ movie together. That sounds good--”

“Mmmmmmn _no_ ,” says Stefon, pushing him back into his seat properly. Seth slides over the vinyl and slumps. “Sit. I’m surprised you can see anything at _all_ right now.”

He puts his hands on his hips, and when Seth finally stops squirming, he pushes out a breath, along with his hands. It looks like patience in motion.

Seth squints against the spotlights.

“How’d you know I’d be here?”

“Because you used my personal-use password and I’d only given it to you. _Plus_ you told me you were taking Nicole to Mexico,” Stefon says impatiently, “and that’s a trip you’d _never_ go on. It’s reserved for your brother’s fortieth birthday, as far as I’m aware. Correct?”

“Yeah, correct,” Seth admits. 

“You also called Nicole your _serious girlfriend_ …”

“She was!” he protests, and then shuts his stupid trap when Stefon raises his eyebrows. “Right, okay, she _was_ , yeah. I’m still… processing it.”

“For nearly six months, now?”

“Yes, _thanks_ ,” he snaps, “I know you don’t have the time to get hung up on any of your hookups _ever_ , Stefon, but if you could have some sympathy and let me do my thing then I’d _super_ appreciate it. Okay?”

Stefon purses his lips towards the Human Skeeball rig, where someone’s just scored a fifty-pointer.

“I didn’t mean that,” says Seth quietly. “I’m sorry.”

“I understand,” Stefon says. He believes him - he might be the only person who _could_ understand. “Do you want to name a roach after her at the Bronx Zoo?”

“Not really. She’d prefer one of those mice or ducklings that get fed to the snakes.”

Stefon scooches into the seat next to him, forcing Seth to sit upright and prop himself up by his elbows against the booth’s table, and says: “I think this is more about what _you_ prefer, Seth Meyers.”

Which kind of makes him want to cry. He needs jokey, inappropriate Stefon right now, and he’s fresh outta fucking luck.

Playing with his hands, he asks, “what would you do if-- if no-one could see you?”

“Ruin a perfectly good rowing machine,” Stefon replies instantly. “Why, what about you?”

He’s got perfect, perfect posture right now. Shoulders back, chin up, attentive and wrapping his sleeves around his wrists in that nervous way he always does. Seth, on the other hand, looks _and_ feels like an inflatable car dealership mascot at half power.

“I’d do _so_ many things, Stefon… I’d look more. Y’know?”

“At what?”

“At _who_ ,” Seth mumbles. “I don’t like sharing. Sometimes audiences don’t react the way you want to a joke. Or they take something serious and twist it, and then it’s _my_ fault, it’s my fault for not delivering it properly--”

Stefon’s frowning.

“What’s the joke?”

“Me,” he explains uselessly, pulse thudding in his ears, “and love, and _me_. But mostly, like… I think I’ve tactically not been noticing how I’m attracted to guys, for _my whole goddamn life._ And I'm not as forward-thinkin' about gender stuff as I thought I was. It’s kinda making me want to throw up.”

“That might just be the alcohol you’ve marinated yourself in,” Stefon points out. “You’ve had a _lot_. And that’s _me_ saying that, I won Tetanus Joel’s ‘Booze or Lose’ Marathon three years running.”

“Maybe a little? No, I think it was the rom-com parody Justin Timberlake did tonight, about his love interest being transgender,” Seth says miserably. “I think I might be a bad person, Stefon! He was all like, _‘I don’t care if you don’t have the parts I’m used to!’_ , which was _super_ weird to be talking about with his coworkers at the bakery, by the way, but even then, like-- is it _bad_ to care? Is that not something that might be important to take an interest in? Why couldn’t he say, like, _‘it matters and I care and I’m glad you shared that with me! I’m sorry I kicked you out of my dorm! My frat brothers were really scary sometimes and I ran a hot dog stand and it would have been the easiest target in the world’_ \--!”

“This doesn’t sound like the parody anymore,” Stefon says slowly.

Seth crumples his face into his hands. “No… I think that was decade-old excuses.”

“Shall we do this somewhere else?” Stefon suggests, which might be code for _you’re bringing the mood down in this nice establishment, come on now, it’s time to go home_.

So Seth follows him outside, down the three blocks it takes to find a cab around here, and only pauses twice on the way to throw up. Stefon, bless everything about his bizarre jittery self, stands guard while he’s puking on the sidewalk, and doesn’t say anything about it.

Well, that Seth remembers, anyway. Things are getting pretty foggy.

“You’ve caught me in a moment of crisis,” he says next, slurring and finding himself in the backseat of a cab. “Also, who knew a moment could be, like, two years? My to-do list is a _mess,_ I should get on that--”

Stefon is looking at Seth as though his IQ is printed on his forehead, and that the number is ‘nine’.

“You _know_ people can be bisexual, right?” he says.

Huh. Guess he’ll never find out how they got onto that topic. “Of course!” Seth says indignantly, “I just… I thought it was a thing that happened to other people. I didn’t think it would happen to _me_.”

“Oh my stars, I’ve fallen for the only man in New York with _negative_ brain cells. My agony aunt is going to _love_ this one,” Stefon mutters.

Seth’s about to come up with a retort for that, but a sickening lurch in the road distracts him so effectively that he forgets it instantly, and spends the rest of the cab ride trying not to throw up. And crying. And trying not to cry so hard that he throws up.

When the taxi stops at last, Seth takes a few deep breaths to propel himself into action again.

“Do you wanna come inside?”

“I--”

“No, wait, that’s a dumb idea, you’ve done enough,” he rambles, and pushes a few bills into Stefon’s hand to cover his cab fare three times over, and hauls himself out of the vehicle. “I’m a jerk. Go find another party monster, have a nice night-- Thanks, for like, giving me the chance to die in the comfort of my own home instead of the Bronx.”

Stefon’s sat in the far seat, buckled up and peering out into the night and clutching dollars uselessly in his hand. He looks horrified, and not in an _‘oh nooo, that’s terrible hahaha!’_ way - it’s just _‘oh nooo… that’s terrible’_.

Which is _much_ worse.

“Seth, you’ve--”

Seth leans on the top of the door and makes eye contact. He hopes it makes him look earnest. He hopes he can round off the night with perhaps some more palatable vulnerability to soften it somewhat. “I wish we’d been born different,” he mumbles, “you and me, y’know?” and Stefon responds with a look that screams _hurt_ , and his shoulders tense so hard that it looks like it’s causing him actual pain.

Distantly, Seth’s aware he’s just made an enormous mistake.

That hadn’t come out the way he’d wanted.

“I _always_ pick you first,” Stefon says, bitter, mostly breath, like it would be too sharp a sentence if he gave it proper voice. “ _Always_. There’s never been a time that I blew off Seth Meyers for someone else. And if he doesn’t realize by now that he’s Stefon’s first choice, then there’s no hope for either of them.”

“Stefon--” he tries.

But Stefon stretches over and closes the taxi door himself, leaving Seth standing on the sidewalk outside his apartment like a lover in the doghouse. It takes five tries for him to get his key in the lock. He doesn’t even take off his shoes before passing out on his couch - he catches glimpses of half-discarded nightmares, like snippets of a tattered film reel, where he has an amazing night with the transgender girl from college that one time, and then she sits up in bed and says, _‘why do you hate me, Seth? You’re_ _never_ _going to be a nice person-- I haven’t slept in three days. I’ve always wanted to go to Cuba. He called you a hundred and four times, that night.’_

And when Seth’s memory reboots to the tune of him hunched over the toilet bowl, white stars spotting his vision and the porcelain freezing the skin of his hands, and the tiles hurting his knees, and the despondent drunken crying and retching making his face prickle hot, he wishes desperately that he _was_ born different. It just didn’t come out right.

Stefon thought he’d meant for him to be born a girl, maybe, so that they could be straight together. Or maybe he’d thought Seth had been referring to himself, being born queerer than a football bat and ready to elope with him at his convenience.

But Seth wishes he knew how to _explain_ it. Because he’s not brave, he’s scared, and he’s working on being more accepting but he just hurt someone he really cares about.

What he’d actually meant, with all of his heart, was: _born into a world where this was easier._


	14. Chapter 14

**May 2013**

They don’t spend Spring Break together. He never finds out what the criteria is for Stefon’s Five-Timers’ Club. He doesn’t see Stefon again until the next show he’s scheduled in for.

And it is _miserable_.

Amy Poehler drops by his apartment, for one night in April while she’s passing through to Europe, and insists on sitting through the whole story. Seth compromises with _half_ the story - i.e., the bare bones of what went down. What he can remember saying, and what he can remember Stefon replying with, and nothing else. It’s in case he sways her judgement, or in case he makes excuses for himself; that’s just sensible journalism.

Unfortunately, Amy’s not as telepathic as Seth had hoped she’d be.

“Well,” she says, “it’s hard to tell when you’ve only _acted out the dialogue_ to me, because you’re not talking about the feelings that drove you to behave like an ass, but have you - oh, I don’t know - tried _talking about the feelings_ with him?”

Seth jabs a finger at her. “We don’t _do_ that!”

“Then _start_ ,” she says, practical and infuriating.

The prospect’s not just terrifying - it’s life-shorteningly, pants-pissingly _frightening_. Seth sulks in the hopes of concealing that part.

“Have you contacted him? At all?”

“Of course I have,” he says irritably, “I’ve texted him, I’ve called him, I wrote him a goddamn letter, I even tried knocking on his door! One of each, so I wasn’t being a clingy asshole. I just wanna tell him I’m sorry. I can’t do anything else.”

“Can’t, or won’t?”

 _“Can’t,”_ he says, “I’m not ready for this, Poehler, I’m not-- I _can’t._ ”

This ‘trying to deal with identity issues instead of ignoring them’ thing is turning out to be _real_ difficult.

Who knew something that could make you _so_ happy - that could fill your _whole being_ with a near-physical joy, simply because of being alive - would bring undercurrents of doubt? Riptides of fear, to drag him down until he’s panicking and struggling for air? All the advertising campaigns say it’ll get better, but he’s not sure they’re right, because how can it get better when you have your sexuality crisis the year you turn forty, and fuck things up with the one person who might have a fighting chance of understanding you?

“I haven’t even spoken to Nicole about this,” he tells Amy. “He’s her friend too, but I don’t know if she knows. I don’t know if they’ve been _talking_. I don’t know _anything,_ except that I’m a stupid dipshit.”

“You’re not a stupid dipshit all the time,” Amy supplies, and pats the space on the couch next to her, to soothingly rub at his back when he collapses down. “Whatever happens, Meyers - you’ve still got _me_. Always.”

Seth hopes he can smooth things over. But if not… 

Well, it’s already more than enough for a life, to have Amy Poehler by your side. He'll learn to be grateful for who he's goddamn got while they're still _there._

* * *

And oh, god, is he thankful for her presence when she comes back to host with him.

The pre-show period is full of frantic nonsense - the make-up schedule is out of whack, the props department are losing their minds, and last-minute stuff like minor script revisions are sending everyone up the wall. People are crammed into dressing rooms together, or running lines right there in the corridors, and Seth feels like he can barely move.

He almost freezes entirely when he spots Stefon. Talking genially to a camera operator whom Seth recognises as a woman called Taneesha, he’s an Ed Hardy-clad pillar by the wall of paint cans.

As soon as she inevitably gets summoned elsewhere, Seth swoops right in.

“Stefon--”

“Ohhhh, boy,” says Stefon, and to his credit, he stands his ground.

Seth makes the most conscious effort in the universe to lower his voice. “Will you hear me out?” he asks, trying not to sound desperate. “Please… Just hear me out.”

When Stefon responds by jutting his chin skywards, and tapping his foot impatiently, he takes it as a tentative ‘yes’.

“I’m _sorry_. I’m sorry for what I said, I’m sorry for being a drunken ass, I’m sorry I went to one of your clubs without you-- and, like, except for my old man at Christmas I didn’t tell _anyone_ about Nicole, but I’m sorry I didn’t talk to _you_ about it especially, and I miss hanging out and having a good time with you.”

And then he breathes, _finally_ , because there’s little else he can do in the meantime.

“Hmmm,” Stefon considers. “I’ve been busy...”

“I bet,” says Seth, “With Spring Break and Easter…”

Stefon quirks an eyebrow: “there’s a _lot_ of gay stuff in tonight’s show.”

“I… I know,” he says. That song from the straight camp sketch has been stuck in his head since Wednesday. “It’s not bad, right? Minnesota came through, that’s a quarter of the country now--”

“Right,” says Stefon, “so will you, like, sit back and enjoy it? Will you try and take it and use it to feel better about yourself, if you’re not gonna do that with _me?”_

Seth doesn’t know what to say, but Stefon looks like he’s expecting some agreement - he nods, feeling as desperate as he didn’t want to appear, and Stefon thinks it over. _Oh_ , Christ in heaven.

“We’re good,” he says eventually, and sniffs. Seth could literally jump for joy, holy _shit_ \- “but you’d better make it up to me in a huge way, Seth Meyers. Stefon does _not_ forget easily.”

“I can do that,” says Seth, who is already panicking.

“Lovely. I’m going to go and talk to Writer Alex, if you’ll excuse me,” he says, and glides past the wall of paint cans to re-enter the fray backstage.

He could cry from sheer relief. Seth doesn’t want to jinx it by bringing it up, but luckily that’s what Amy’s for - mentioning fragile stuff so that he doesn’t have to do it alone.

“How did it go?” 

“You look great in your anchor suit,” he says, deflecting like a pro, “it suits you. You should come back more often.”

Amy cackles and gives him a hefty shove: “Seth, you asshole, how did it _go?”_ she asks.

“Better than expected. But I don’t wanna talk about it right now,” he says.

“So is that a _‘can’t’_ talk about it?” Amy asks. “Or a _‘won’t’_ talk about it?”

Seth fiddles with the buttons on his jacket. He’s aware she’s noticed that he and Stefon aren’t hanging out before the show starts, but he knows she’s _also_ picked up on the significant absence of a huge, explosive blowout. This isn’t her asking _‘can’t’ or ‘won’t’_ \- it’s her asking _‘closeted’, or ‘private’?_

“Won’t,” he finally settles on. “I won’t talk about it, it’s no-one else’s business. Yet. I don’t know, I’m still keeping it all for me right now. I’m gonna figure it out.”

“Selfish,” she grins, but she doesn’t push the subject further.

It’s always fun to host with Amy. Hell, he misses her every week - it’s plain as day when he always taps out her side of the desk, despite her long-standing absence.

But Christ Almighty, does it feel good to introduce Stefon back to the crowd who love him.

He can’t keep himself from enjoying it, even though he knows Alex is gonna be all, _‘hey, what was that, where was the annoyance?’._ It feels natural to slip back into their script, to be able to predict what the other is going to say and have it play out, like a trust fall.

Even though Amy is decidedly _not_ as delighted to see Stefon do his thing as Seth is, it doesn’t bring him down - she just hasn’t been around him as much, that’s all. He grows on you, he really does.

That’s what he’s planning on saying to her after they wrap up the segment… But then Stefon goes in a _totally_ different direction than their usual.

Seth ‘doesn’t respect him’. He’s met someone a lot like him…

And they’re getting _married_.

Not for the first time, Stefon Zolesky has rendered him speechless. In this instance, though, it feels like his beating heart just got ripped out of his chest. The audience actually cry out with disappointment when he exits the set - and he would _love_ to join in, but his voice is failing him.

That’s Stefon.

And he’s _leaving_.

And he’s _done_ with him.

Stefon, with his considerate and dangerous recommendations. With his political incorrectness, but zero desire to hurt anyone out of malice. Who fell out with the household he was born into, and who promptly decided to find his own family instead, however goddamned weird or wild they were - and who fabricated them entirely when he couldn’t find someone to fit the bill. Stefon Zolesky does his best despite his history and circumstances, and that’s all anyone can ask of him.

Now Seth’s lost out to someone else. He’s been _replaced_. It makes his stomach curdle.

But he’s got a show to finish. And whatever happens, he still has Amy - that much is true.

“A new study show that tree frogs in the--”

The words catch in his throat.

“--that tree frogs in the Amazon have been known to…”

Oh, fuck.

Oh, _fucking_ fuck and _double_ fuck. Amy says ‘hey’ and he barely hears her - it’s just that stupid conversation on the phone they had way back in November, where he’d been crying into junk food and said, _‘Poehler, I think I’m losing my mind,’_ and she’d said, _‘well, that’s long since been documented,’_ and he’d followed up with _‘would you still be-- I think I might--’_ , and she’d said, _‘I know you_ _are_ _, so you’d better get your midlife crisis in order_ _real_ _quick, also I love you no matter what’._

She hadn’t made him talk about it, then.

Maybe it’s time to do something about that.

Seth sprints down Fifth Avenue like a man about to lose it all.

Mostly because he is. But also because he can hear church bells, and he doesn’t want to fuck this up.

He’s a newsreel ticker tape of emotion. The segment replays like an echo in his head: _platonic work friend._ Seth’s such an idiot. Why did he say that? Just to differentiate for Stefon’s sake? To let him know Amy wasn’t, and isn’t, and has never _remotely_ been a threat?

One of the camerawomen is hot on his heels, like he’s trailing broadcast lightning, and he barely notices. In fact, he kind of blacks out for a few minutes in the middle of it all, and when he comes out the other side, one of his hands stings like a motherfucker.

The other is clasped, airtight, with Stefon’s.

Stefon’s rings are cutting into his knuckles because they’re holding on so hard to one another. Seth blinks against the New York City night and can’t help it, his bloodstream is pure adrenaline and he lets everything pour out of him in torrents:

“I didn’t mean my drunk bullshit like that-- I’m so _sorry_ , Stefon!” he says, jostling them closer together without thought, “I just wanted to be right for you, I want that so much, because you are _so_ much fun, and you being in my life forever would make me the happiest person on the planet. Does that make any sense?” he asks frantically. “Tell me you get what I’m saying, Stefon, _please_ \--”

“I can’t believe you, Seth Meyers!” Stefon furiously bursts out. He’s grinning ear to ear. “I made my choice three years ago and you’ve been _doubting Stefon’s judgement?!_ Outrageous!”

“You mean--?”

“You’ve always been the right fit, it was just _you_ who needed to catch up,” he chides, puffing his veil out of his eyes. “I gave up on waiting.”

“Oh,” says Seth.

All the energy drains from him in one fluid second. The last five minutes are catching up with him:

“Did I, uh… Did I just come out on live TV by punching an older gay man in the face?”

And Stefon looks at him with cartoonishly widening eyes, as though Seth had just suggested for him to change his name to Stephen MacMillan, purchase a sensible day suit, and try to shoot for that business school scholarship. The realization seems to have sunk in simultaneously for the both of them, in some contagious, relaxing panic.

“Uh-huh,” he breathes. “You did… Yes.”

The streetlights are like streaming yellow stars in the corners of his vision. He feels _faint_. “Okay, cool. I’m just making sure…”

With a tilt of his head, Stefon rubs his fingertips against his mouth and wobbles. “Um, Seth Meyers…?” he asks. “Why _did_ you do that?”

“‘Cos I love you,” says Seth.

Ever so slowly, Stefon closes his eyes, and just as carefully opens them again.

It’s the easiest thing ever to tell him.

“Because even if something’s scary, it doesn’t mean it can’t be the best part of your year. Someone once told me you could be changed forever, in a beautiful way,” he says, because the words are seared into his brain without him minding one little bit, and Stefon stares at him like he sculpted the Statue of Liberty herself with nothing but his shaking hands. Slightly hysterical, Seth finds himself cackling: “you know,” he laughs, “I didn’t even finish Weekend Update--”

“You _didn’t?!”_ Stefon explodes.

“Nope!”

He yanks Seth by the hand, breaking into a jog: “well, we gotta go back right now, we gotta close up your segment! Aieaieaie, Seth Meyers, you can’t just _leave--_ ”

“I can for you,” he grins, and they sprint back to 30 Rock, and they don’t say anything else to each other until they burst back into the studio, where Amy’s given everyone packets of rice and covered up their absence by broadcasting the fight that broke out in the church, and he decides to go the whole fucking way and confess his feelings right there in the open on live television.

Now _that_ is more straightforward than a well-aimed punch.

The Devil calls them an Uber. (It’s not the weirdest thing to happen to Seth today.)

“It’s on me, kid,” he smiles, calm as ever, “I know the value of a quick getaway when you need one. You Meyerses go crazy, y’hear?”

Stefon wordlessly kisses the Devil on the cheek before pulling Seth downstairs. (It’s still not the weirdest thing to happen to Seth today.)

Tumbling into the cabin of a luxury car, laughing and falling over each other, Stefon settles into his seat. And Seth can’t stop looking at him, can’t tear his eyes away. Stefon left his bridal veil with Amy Poehler as a silent _thank you_ before they left. His eye makeup is smeared, he’s breathless and his sleeves have ridden halfway up his arms, and Seth truly thinks he’s the most beautiful person in the universe.

“Seth Meyers, are you _crying?”_

“No,” Seth weeps, hurriedly wiping at his eyes, “I’m fine. I’m _happy_.”

Between them, Seth’s cell phone has fallen out of his pocket. It vibrates non-stop against the seats:

**Poehler🐪** **  
****Text Message**

 **Dad** **  
****Missed call (2)**

 **Mom** **  
****Text Message (7)**

 **Nicole** **  
****Text Message**

 **Mulaney** **  
****Text Message**

 **Alex** **  
****Text Message (4)**

“Holy shit,” says Seth, because this is just a preview of his messages and calls. He hasn’t even _looked_ at Twitter yet.

Stefon eyes the preview pane.

So Seth puts his cell in his jacket pocket. “Who gives a shit about that?” he grins. “This is _my_ thing, with _you_. On _our_ night. I don’t hear anyone else needing to be involved, there…”

There’s a beat, as they both digest this information and what it means.

Seth’s really just… going around, figuring out how to do things without needing the approval of the world now. A switch got flicked somewhere in him and it can't be turned back. It’s horrifyingly freeing. He feels like there’s so many curdling emotions inside him that the result is ‘not giving a fresh fuck about shit-all’.

 _David Zolesky_ just saw him elope with his not-so-estranged brother! And Seth’s so past it that he’s cracking up.

Lunacy.

“Well,” Stefon says matter-of-factly. He doesn’t seem fazed by the prospect of what comes next. “This is more dramatic than a PBS Thanksgiving Special.”

Seth blinks. “...What?”

“A PBS Thanksgiving Special,” Stefon repeats. “It’s that _thing,_ where they make you dress up like Big Bird, and you have to perform a successful hit on the mafia guy who had that grocery store front? Then you can collect the bounty.”

Seth widens his eyes. “Oh, _don’t_. Do _not_ ruin Sesame Street for me with organized crime. I’ve interviewed Big Bird, he was a nice kid--”

“I know, it’s barbaric,” Stefon sighs, and continues with his tarnishing of Seth’s childhood. “They don’t even sweep out the suit before they cram you in there, it’s like a New England hazing ritual. That sweaty avian prison had _white_ feathers before the made men in Boston got ahold of him--”

He’ll go on forever if someone doesn’t change the subject. 

And Seth can’t stop himself from cutting in. 

“Oh my god,” he breathes, “shut _up_ about Big Bird,” and without warning, still lost in a haze of spontaneity and disbelief, still wondering why he’s so, _so_ drawn to this club kid with the near-perfect pacing and the razor-sharp cheekbones, Seth pulls him in by the jaw and opens up his mouth for him, and doesn’t care if he _ever_ figures it out. 

Stefon makes a noise that buzzes wetly over their lips, and drags him closer by the tie.

And then they're kissing. Moving against each other and grabbing at the skin they can reach, with bumping noses and short sharp breaths. It's been coming on a while, and now they're doing it. 

Even if he’d wanted to, Seth wouldn’t be able to take in the sight - his eyelids flood with a need to close, like they know it would be too overwhelming for him to witness this, so he lets them flutter shut about two seconds before Stefon’s tongue slips into his mouth. Stefon’s lips are bitten to hell, but underneath him he’s coarse iron and warm determination and _constantly_ adjusting his posture to shift closer.

Holy shit. Seth should’ve done this ages ago.

“I’m sorry I spent-- so long-- being _weird_ about this whole thing,” he gets out, between the first milestone he’s started on his own terms. 

To which Stefon only just stops long enough to reply, “it’s okay, you can’t help being a douche,” and that’s fucking _funny_. Seth bursts out laughing and crowds him into the corner, where the door meets the cab seats and his hands meet clavicle.

There’s a soft, hollow _thunk_ as the back of Stefon’s head rests against the window. 

“--You good?”

“Never better,” says Stefon, wrapping his hands around the backs of Seth’s thighs and squeezing when he pulls him closer, bracketing Seth’s hips with his knees above his grip. Because, y’know, Seth’s pinning him against the door handles of the backseat, half-knelt between his legs, and kissing him with tongue.

Did Anderson Cooper punch _him?_ It certainly feels like it. It’s hard to think over the small, frequent noises that they keep huffing into the space between them, but it could also be that his brain’s broken down. Stefon wraps his arms over Seth’s shoulders, curling into him and short-circuiting his thought process a little more - Seth has both hands in Stefon’s hair and he's messing it up something amazing. Oh, god, what is _happening._

He draws back: “I did this whole taxi shebang pretty poorly last time.”

“You’re doing okay so far,” shrugs Stefon, but he wets his lips and gives himself away.

Seth raises his eyebrows.

“Only _‘okay’?”_

“There’s… room for improvement,” he decides, and dissolves into cackles at Seth’s expression.

“No problem,” Seth scowls, over the chiming of Stefon’s giggling, “there’s _time_ for improvement! I’ve never done this before, cut a guy some slack. Mr Meyers Numero Uno has some catching up to do.”

That shuts Stefon up. “Oh, that reminds me!” he says, rummaging for something stashed, “I have something for you--”

“Is that a button in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?” Seth grins. Then, surprised, he falters: “Oh, it _is_ a button. Huh… _Two_ buttons.”

“I’ve been saving these,” breathes Stefon. “Gay and bi. I wasn’t sure which one you might end up needing… If you’re something else then let me know, I can get--

Seth curls his fingers around the purple pin and jabs it into his lapel. “You’re _insane_ ,” he says, “how long have you had these? Were you really waiting for me to have a sexuality crisis this whole time? That’s crazy levels of sheer hope, Stefon.” 

He rolls his eyes. “Sue me for wanting to make sure you have a support system.” 

“Oh, is _that_ what we’re calling it.” 

“What are we calling it?” Stefon retorts.

“Our wedding,” says Seth. “Me, like… marrying you. That's what I call it.”

Stefon bites his lip, looks at how Seth is positioned between his legs, and slowly lets his eyes crinkle up with glee.

“You do?”

“I do,” Seth says.

He's so nervous that he feels physically sick.

But then Stefon doesn’t so much nod as vibrate rapidly: “yeah, me too,” he whispers, “let’s figure it out tomorrow. I _do._ ”

“Awesome,” says Seth, and kisses him again, just because he can.

What a luxury that’s turning out to be.

“…Have you ever seen Aurora Borealis?”

“A few times,” replies Stefon, “I was enrolled in the stage makeup short course that she ran back in the day. Her eyeliner had a wingspan like a gangsta albatross…”

“That wasn’t what I was thinking of.”

“What _are_ you thinking of?” Stefon asks. His face is scrunched up, frown and smile colliding in crinkles.

“Honestly? A lot of stuff’s running through my head right now,” Seth confesses. “I’m not totally sure. I guess I just got hit with the idea of all the sex I’m about to have, so that’s pretty terrifying.”

Stefon pokes his third shirt button. “And you were thinking Aurora Borealis was the best location for that?”

“I’ve never done this before!” he repeats. God, this is _sheer lunacy_ \- he can’t help but collapse into laughter again. “Stefon - I can’t believe our first real date is gonna be our fucking _honeymoon_.”

“When did we _ever_ do anything in the order we’re supposed to?” he points out. “Let’s _honeymoon_ , Seth Meyers. That’s a real good way to make it up to me. We can see landmarks and stay in a pretty suite and completely butcher a whole language together. And I’ll laugh my cute ass off when you get mugged in Kingston, or too high in Amsterdam--”

“If you let that shit happen to me, I’m divorcing you,” Seth says, semi-seriously.

“No, you won’t,” Stefon teases, “We’re not even formally married yet! We should get a blessing or something--”

“License. The word you’re looking for is ‘license’.”

“Oh, I don’t know, I didn’t even want a priest, least of all stuffy Black Washington,” Stefon says flippantly, and swats a hand at the air, as if to shoo away the whole affair. “ _I_ wanted to get married by my good friend Rabbi Phillips. I get to smash stuff that way.”

“We can do that when we get back,” says Seth.

“From _where?”_

(Oh, he’s _so_ about to win the entirety of marriage _ever_.)

“Ever been to Havana?”

There it is: Stefon goes _white_.

“Seth Meyers,” he breathes. “You _know_ I haven’t.”

“ _Stefon_ Meyers,” Seth bites back, grinning, and gives their hands a squeeze. “I bet I can have us on a plane to Cuba within two days.”

“No _way_.”

“ _Yes_ way,” he grins, “hell, I’ll take you to IKEA when we get back, and you can get all the breakable kitchenware you want. I’ll destroy glass things with you, totally. That sounds good! That sounds _really_ good.”

“I’m going to have to make a mess of you in this good Catholic city we’re going to,” Stefon says gently, cradling Seth’s face, “it’s _such_ a pity. Such a _shame_.”

“Is it?” he asks.

His face hurts from smiling. He can’t stop, even when Stefon pulls him in closer by the jaw and kisses him mindless all over again, filthy and oddly sweet and crammed with the promise of a half-baked, illogical future.

He remembers Stefon saying once that his typical plans for a day like Halloween were to wake up and go home - and isn’t that something? Because the same old routines can change entirely, if you simply adjust the intent behind them.

They’re wide awake, now. And they’re heading home. 

* * *

_Sometimes the party takes you places_ _  
__That you didn’t really plan on going_

**Author's Note:**

>   
>  (Holy shit, I have put a lot of effort into something that _very_ few folk are gonna read. But I had fun! And that's what matters.)  
> 
> 
> Thanks for sticking with this, fam! Appreciate it. You can find me on tumblr [@futureboy-ao3](https://futureboy-ao3.tumblr.com/), or in the comments here, if you want to talk.
> 
> I'm considering writing a sequel to this. What kind of things would people want to see from post-marriage Stefon? Let me know.
> 
> Finally - if you'd consider leaving kudos or commenting I'd love that! Ta all! ☺


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